Of working-class origins, Thomas Holcroft was one of many self-educated plebeian writers of his time who promoted social, cultural, and political reform. He wrote little of a directly polemical or theoretical nature, but he had a comprehensive vision of moral, social, and political reform that he disseminated through a wide variety of literary genres, including poetry, journalism, travels, translations, novels and plays-especially the last three. In addition, he collaborated closely with William Godwin as the latter worked on his Enquiry concerning Political Justice (1793), the first comprehensive statement of philosophical anarchism and a highly influential book. Holcroft articulated the same arguments in popular genres. He thought of himself as a philosopher in a sense common at the time: a social critic working in the intellectual and cultural spheres to bring about a better world.

The son of a cobbler and grandson of a cooper, Thomas Holcroft came from the...