Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance

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Following the successful opening run of

Lady Windermere’s Fan

in the St James’s Theatre, London, in 1892, Herbert Beerbohm Tree, actor-manager at the rival Haymarket Theatre, asked Oscar Wilde to provide him with a similar modern society comedy. That summer, while staying in Norfolk with Lord Alfred Douglas, Wilde was engaged in writing a piece with the working title “Mrs Arbuthnot”. In September 1892 he reported that the play was nearly finished, and, on 13 October, he assigned the rights of the completed play, now entitled

A Woman of No Importance

, to Tree, specifying in detail the financial terms of their agreement (Holland and Hart-Davis, eds., 2000, pp. 535, 536). Rehearsals began the following March, and the play ran from 19 April to 16 August 1893. The relationship between…

2332 words

Citation: Markey, Anne. "A Woman of No Importance". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 07 March 2011 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=6908, accessed 19 March 2024.]

6908 A Woman of No Importance 3 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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