born June 20, 1674, Little Barford, Bedfordshire, Eng.
died Dec. 6, 1718, London
English writer.
His plays, which did much to assist the rise of domestic tragedy (in which the protagonists are middle-class rather than aristocratic), include The Ambitious Step-Mother (1700), Tamerlane (1702), The Fair Penitent (1703), The Tragedy of Jane Shore (1714), and The Tragedy of the Lady Jane Grey (1715). He is also remembered as the first to attempt a critical edition of William Shakespeare ( The Works of Mr. William Shakespear , 1709, 1714). His own poetry includes odes and translations. He became poet laureate in 1715. Rowe is regarded as the foremost 18th-century English tragic dramatist.