Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Rowley, William

ROWLEY, William, actor and dramatist, collaborated with several of the celebrated dramatists of the Elizabethan period—Dekker, Middleton, Heywood, Fletcher, Webster, Massinger, and Ford. Nothing is known of his life except that he was an actor in various companies, and married in 1637. There was another Rowley, an actor and playright in the same generation, Samuel, and probably a third, Ralph. Four plays by W. Rowley are extant,—A Woman never Vext (printed 1632), A Match at Midnight (1633), All's Lost by Lust (1633), and A Shoemaker a Gentleman (1638). From these an opinion may be formed of his individual style. Effectiveness of situation and ingenuity of plot are more marked in them than any special literary faculty, from which we may conjecture why he was in such request as an associate in play-making. There are significant quotations from two of his plays in Lamb's Specimens. It is recorded by Langbaine that he "was beloved of those great men Shakespeare, Fletcher, and Jonson"; and the tradition of his personal amiability is supported by the fact of his partnerships with so many different writers.