Hesketh Pearson was an accomplished and prolific biographer whose work is distinguished by enthusiasm, wit, and geniality. He was at his best when writing on the major literary and theatrical figures of the nineteenth century. The Life of Oscar Wilde (1946) and Gilbert: His Life and Strife (1957) bring the reader irresistibly under the spell of their subjects. It is safe to predict that Pearson's best biographies will continue to give pleasure and instruction to fresh generations of readers.

Edward Hesketh Collins Pearson was born on 20 February 1887 at Hawford in Worcestershire to Thomas Henry Collins Pearson and Constance Biggs Pearson. His father was a gentleman-farmer; his paternal grandfather, John Pearson, was in Anglican orders. On completing his schooling at Bedford Grammar School, Pearson, by his own admission, "wasted two years in a City shipping office." He joined the theatrical company of Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree in 1911 and later worked in...