A Londoner whose interests ran from cricket to theosophy, Clifford Bax was a playwright, poet, novelist, biographer, autobiographer, editor, and critic. His plays appeared on the British stage from 1912 to 1946. While they brought him a modest contemporary reputation, neither the general public nor the critics accorded them that degree of praise Bax sought and which the best of them deserved. Dismissed variously as entertaining, shallow, and mere poetic trifles, the plays suffer in reputation still, largely because Bax, in writing plays poetic in form and based upon unpopular philosophical and theological premises, fought against the dominant taste of the time for realistic drama, a style he saw as ugly, materialistic, and soulless. Bax's success, however, like his failure, is one of degree. Though it seems unlikely that his reputation in drama will ever rise above that of a competent minor figure, much of his work contains literary qualities...