Nicholas Rowe

Born in 1674, he was educated at Westminster School and later entered the Middle Temple, but he became known above all as a man of letters. He built his reputation in London as a dramatist and poet, with plays including The Fair Penitent and Jane Shore, works that were widely read and performed in their time.

He is especially notable in literary history for his 1709 edition of Shakespeare, an early attempt to present Shakespeare’s plays in a more carefully edited form and to add a short life of the playwright. That work helped secure his lasting place not just as a creative writer, but also as an important early editor of English literature.

Later in life he also held public office and was named Poet Laureate. He died in 1718, but his name remains closely tied to both Restoration and early 18th-century theatre, as well as to the growing admiration for Shakespeare in print.