Cook, DUTTON

Cook, DUTTON, dramatic critic and author, the son of a solicitor, was born in London, 30th January 1829, spent four years in his father's office, then entered a railway office, which he left to follow the full bent of his literary and artistic tastes. He studied painting and engraving, wrote a successful melodrama, acted as dramatic critic for the Pall Mall Gazette, 1867-75, and then for the World till his death, 11th September 1883. He wrote for various newspapers and magazines, including Temple Bar and Chambers's Journal, and his eight novels, and others, were always interesting and well written, but sometimes failed in catching the average novel-reader. He wrote the dramatic and theatrical lives for the first two volumes of the Dictionary of National Biography, was also author of A Book of the Play (1876), Hours with the Players (1881), and On the Stage (1883).