Allan Noble Monkhouse was an English playwright, critic, essayist and novelist.

He was born in Barnard Castle

Barnard Castle

Barnard Castle is an historical town in Teesdale, County Durham, England. It is named after the castle around which it grew up. It sits on the north side of the River Tees, opposite Startforth, south southwest of Newcastle upon Tyne, south southwest of Sunderland, west of Middlesbrough and ...

, County Durham

County Durham

County Durham is a ceremonial county and unitary district in north east England. The county town is Durham. The largest settlement in the ceremonial county is the town of Darlington...

. He worked in the cotton

Cotton

Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective capsule, around the seeds of cotton plants of the genus Gossypium. The fiber is almost pure cellulose. The botanical purpose of cotton fiber is to aid in seed dispersal....

 trade, in Manchester

Manchester

Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...

, and settled in Disley

Disley

Disley is a village and civil parish in the unitary authority of Cheshire East and the ceremonial county of Cheshire, England. It is located on the very edge of the Peak District, in the Goyt Valley, very close to the county boundary with Derbyshire at New Mills, and south of Stockport, Greater...

, Cheshire

Cheshire

Cheshire is a ceremonial county in North West England. Cheshire's county town is the city of Chester, although its largest town is Warrington. Other major towns include Widnes, Congleton, Crewe, Ellesmere Port, Runcorn, Macclesfield, Winsford, Northwich, and Wilmslow...

. From 1902 to 1932 he worked on the Manchester Guardian, writing also for the New Statesman

New Statesman

New Statesman is a British centre-left political and cultural magazine published weekly in London. Founded in 1913, and connected with leading members of the Fabian Society, the magazine reached a circulation peak in the late 1960s....

.

As second in command at the Guardian, Monkhouse helped to launch the career of James Agate

James Agate

James Evershed Agate was a British diarist and critic. In the period between the wars, he was one of Britain's most influential theatre critics...

 by publishing his open letters from France during the first World War. Agate appears in Monkhouse's play "Nothing Like Leather" barely disguised as the theatre critic "Topaz".

He began to write drama for the Gaiety Theatre, Manchester

Gaiety Theatre, Manchester

The Gaiety Theatre, Manchester was a theatre in Manchester, England. It was opened in 1884 and demolished in 1959. It replaced a previous Gaiety Theatre on the site which had been destroyed by fire....

, shortly after it was opened by Annie Horniman

Annie Horniman

Annie Elizabeth Fredericka Horniman CH was an English theatre patron and manager. She established the Abbey Theatre in Dublin and founded the first regional repertory theatre company in Britain at the Gaiety Theatre in Manchester. She encouraged the work of new writers and playwrights, including...

, along with Stanley Houghton and Harold Brighouse

Harold Brighouse

Harold Brighouse was an English playwright and author whose best known play is Hobson's Choice. He was a prominent member, together with Allan Monkhouse and Stanley Houghton, of a group known as the Manchester School of dramatists.-Early life:Harold Brighouse was born in Eccles, Salford, the...

, forming a school of realist dramatists independent of the London stage, who were known as the Manchester School

Manchester School (writers)

The "Manchester School" is a term applied to a number of playwrights from Manchester, England, who were active in the early 20th century. The leading figures in the group were Harold Brighouse, Stanley Houghton and Allan Monkhouse. They were championed by Annie Horniman, owner of the Gaiety...

.

Works

• Books & Plays (1894) essays
• A Deliverance (1898) novel
• Love in a Life (1903) novel
• Reaping the Whirlwind (1908) play
• The Choice (1910) play
• Mary Broome: A Comedy in Four Acts (1912)
• Nothing Like Leather (1913) play
• Four Tragedies (1913)
• The Education of Mr. Surrage: A Comedy in Four Acts (1913)
• Men & Ghosts (1918)
• True Love (1920)
• My Daughter Helen (1922)
• The Conquering Hero (1923) play
• First Blood, a play in four acts (1924)
• Sons And Fathers: A Play in Four Acts (1925)
• Essays of To-Day and Yesterday (1925)
• Suburb (1925)
• Alfred the Great (1927)
• The Rag (1928) play
• Paul Felice (1930)
• Farewell Manchester (1931)
• The Grand Cham's Diamond (1932) play
• Cecilia (1932)

External links