Robert E. Sherwood was a popular American playwright and novelist of the twentieth century. His works reflected the concerns of the generation that had lived through the First World War. They often explored the horrors of modern warfare and the moral choices that were required of those who participated in war. Sherwood was born on April 4, 1896, and attended Milton Academy, graduating from Harvard with a bachelor of arts degree in 1917. When he tried to enlist in the American army during World War I, he was rejected, and so he joined the Canadian infantry. During the war, he was wounded and was sprayed with toxic mustard gas. On his return from the war, he became a magazine movie reviewer, first for Vanity Fair and then for Life. He was, in fact, one of the country's first serious film critics. By the mid-1920s, he was an editor...