Henry Arthur Jones
Vanity Fair Print
£50.00
Henry Arthur Jones (20 September 1851 – 7 January 1929) was an English dramatist, who was first noted for his melodrama The Silver King (1882), and went on to write prolifically, often appearing to mirror Ibsen from the opposite (conservative) viewpoint. As a right-winger, he engaged in extensive debates with left-wing writers such as George Bernard Shaw and H. G. Wells.
"There are three rules for writing plays," said Oscar Wilde. "The first rule is not to write like Henry Arthur Jones; the second and third rules are the same."[13] This comic belittling is prompted by Wilde's aloof attitude in distancing himself from the foibles of the middle and higher classes, as opposed to Jones' method of realistic observations (from his viewpoint) on the way ordinary people act, though mainly emphasizing faults and weaknesses.
by Sir Leslie Ward
chromolithograph, published in Vanity Fair 2 April 1892