A Lancashire man, born in Salford, Walter Greenwood, son of Tom and Elizabeth Greenwood, was always ready to declare his education: "Langworthy Road Council School, Salford; by self." Certainly it was the most variegated experience a potential writer could have had. When he was twelve he began part-time work as a milk roundsman's boy and pawnbroker's clerk. When he left school at thirteen, he worked as an office boy; then stable boy at a millionaire's private stable and later at a racing stable; clerk; packingcase maker; sign writer; cabdriver; warehouseman; and salesman. He never earned more than thirty-five shillings a week until employed for a few months in an automobile factory; and three or four times he was on the dole.

"On the dole" is part of the title of Greenwood's first novel and first play--a play written jointly with an older man, Ronald Gow--by which Greenwood was...