Anderson, Maxwell (1888-1959), an American playwright, brought seriousness and idealism to the theater. He wrote several realistic plays, including the war drama What Price Glory? (with Laurence Stallings, 1924) and the psychological melodrama The Bad Seed (1955). But his major contributions were historical plays, verse dramas, and his attempts to revive traditional heroic tragedy in the modern theater.
Among Anderson’s historical plays, Elizabeth the Queen (1930) is one of the most significant. This tragedy in verse is based on the romance of Queen Elizabeth and Lord Essex. Like many of Anderson’s works, it pictures the defeat of good by the inevitable forces of evil, but it also praises the counterforces of nobility and love in humanity. Winterset (1935), his most enduring play, is based on the Sacco-Vanzetti case (see Sacco-Vanzetti case). But it mainly deals with the dilemma created when love conflicts with a crusade for justice against evil. Another verse tragedy, Key Largo (1939), explores the difficulties of deciding to fight evil, as symbolized by a gangster. Anderson won the 1933 Pulitzer Prize for his political satire Both Your Houses (1933).
Anderson was born on Dec. 15, 1888, in Atlantic, Pennsylvania. In 1938, he helped found the Playwrights’ Company, which produced many notable plays. He died on Feb. 28, 1959.
