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HENRY JAMES BYRON (1834-1884)

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Originally appearing in Volume V04, Page 906 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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HENRY See also:JAMES See also:BYRON (1834-1884)  , See also:English playwright, son of See also:Henry See also:Byron, at one See also:time See also:British See also:consul at See also:Port-au-See also:Prince, was See also:born in See also:Manchester in See also:January 1834 . He entered the See also:Middle See also:Temple as a student in 1858, with the intention of devoting his time to See also:play-See also:writing . He soon ceased to make any pretence of legal study, and joined a provincial See also:company as an actor . In this See also:line he never made any real success; and, though he continued to See also:act for years, chiefly in his own plays, he had neither originality nor See also:charm . Meanwhile he wrote assiduously, and few men have produced so many pieces of so diverse a nature . He was the first editor of the weekly comic See also:paper, Fun, and started the See also:short-lived Comic Trials . His first successes were in See also:burlesque; but in 1865 he joined See also:Miss See also:Marie See also:Wilton (afterwards See also:Lady See also:Bancroft) in the management of the Prince of See also:Wales's See also:theatre, near See also:Tottenham See also:Court Road . Here several of his pieces, comedies and extravaganzas were produced with success; but, upon his severing the See also:partnership two years later, and starting management on his own See also:account in the provinces, he was financially unfortunate . The commercial success of his See also:life was secured with Our Boys, which was played at the See also:Vaudeville from January 1875 till See also:April 1879—a then unprecedented " run." The Upper Crust, another of his successes, gave a congenial opportunity to Mr J . L . See also:Toole for one of his inimitably broad See also:character-sketches . During the last few years of his life Byron was in frail See also:health; he died in Clapham on the See also:firth of April 1884 .

H . J . Byron was the author of some of the most popular See also:

stage pieces of his See also:day . Yet his extravaganzas have no wit but that of violence; his rhyming couplets are without See also:polish, and decorated only by forced and often pointless puns . His sentiment had T . W . See also:Robertson's insipidity without its freshness, and restored an See also:element of vulgarity which his predecessor had laboured to eradicate from theatrical tradition . He could draw a " See also:Cockney " character with some fidelity, but his dramatis personae were usually See also:mere puppets for the utterance of his jests . Byron was also the author of a novel, Paid in Full (1865), which appeared originally in Temple See also:Bar . In his social relations he had many See also:friends, among whom he was justly popular for geniality and imperturbable See also:good See also:temper .

End of Article: HENRY JAMES BYRON (1834-1884)
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