Though English writer Arthur Wing Pinero (1855-1934) was an extremely successful playwright of his era, a century later his body of work was known almost only in the literary histories of his craft. Pinero first rose to prominence in the 1880s with the comedies, farces, and, later, serious dramas he wrote for the London stage, many of which exposed contemporary social ills and attracted not a small degree of scandal as a result.

Arthur Wing Pinero was born into a fairly well-to-do family of Portuguese heritage in London in 1855. Both his grandfather and father were solicitors, or lawyers, and it was expected that he, too, would enter the firm as a young man. As preparation, he began working there when he was just ten. It was a job the young Pinero grew to dislike, and it strengthened his desire to avoid its more permanent chains. An avid theatergoer...