Although she insists that her true vocation is teaching kindergarten, Margaret Edson has distinguished herself as a dramatist on the basis of her debut play. Wit, which premiered in Costa Mesa, California, in 1995, won several awards before moving to the East Coast. After a short run in New Haven, Connecticut, Wit moved to New York and took the 1999 Pulitzer Prize for drama. Edson also earned the Berilla-Kerr Award, Helen Merrill Award, Dramatists Guild Award, John Gassner Playwriting Award, and George Oppenheimer Playwriting Award for her play. A teacher in Atlanta, Georgia, Edson says that she has no further dramatic or literary ambitions.

Margaret Ann Edson was born on 4 July 1961 in Washington, D.C., the middle child of Peter Edson, a newspaper columnist, and Joyce Winnifred Edson, a medical social worker. The family lived in Washington, where Edson attended public school until the fourth grade, when she enrolled at...