ROWENicholas (1674-1718), the descendant of a family long resident at Lamerton in Devon, was born at Little Barford in Bedfordshire, June 30, 1674. The house in which he was born is close to the Great North Road, and a small stone to his memory has been erected in the centre of the garden. His father, John Rowe, took to the law as his profession, and at his death in 1692 (by which time he had attained to the dignity of being a serjeant at law) had amassed sufficient property to leave to his son an income of £300 a year. Nicholas Rowe passed some time in a private school at Highgate, and then proceeded to Westminster School, at that time under the charge of the celebrated master Dr Busby. In 1688 he became a king’s scholar in this foundation, but three years later he was called away from school and entered as a student at the Middle Temple. Tbe study of the law had little attraction for a young man of good person and lively manners, and at his father’s death in the following year he devoted himself to society and to literature. His first play, The Ambitious Stepmother, was produced when he was twenty-five years old. It was followed by Tamerlane, a patriotic composition in which the virtues of William III. were lauded under the disguise of Tamerlane and the vices of the French king, Louis XIV., were denounced in the person of Bajazet. The popularity of this production soon declined, but for many years it was acted once every year, on the anniversary of the landing at Torbay of the Dutch prince. His next play, The Fair Penitent, long retained the favourable reception which marked its first appearance, and was pronounced by the great critic of the 18th century one of the most pleasing tragedies which had ever been written. Through its success the name of the principal ...male character Lothario became identified in popular language as the embodiment of the manners and habits of a fashionable rake. After the production of two more tragedies, Ulysses and The Royal Convert, of slight account at the time and long since forgotten, Rowe tried; his hand on a comedy, The Biter. Much to the author’s surprise his attempt in this new direction proved a failure, but Rowe recognized the justice of the verdict of the audience sufficiently to abstain from risking a second disappointment. His two last dramatic works were entitled Jane Shore and Lady Jane Grey, and the former of them, from the popularity of its subject and the elegance of its language, kept its position on the stage longer than any other of his works.
Rowe excelled most of his contemporaries in the knowledge of languages. He was acquainted more or less thoroughly with Greek, Latin, French, Italian, and Spanish. The latter tongue he is said to have acquired on the recommendation of Harley and with the expectation that he would afterwards be rewarded by some high office. When, however, he reported his new acquisition to the new minister he was met with the dry remark from Harley—“How I envy you the pleasure of reading Don Quixote in the original !” Notwithstanding this disappointment, Rowe enjoyed many lucrative posts during his short life. When the duke of Queensberry was principal secretary of state for Scotland (1708-10), Rowe acted as his under-secretary. On the accession of George I. he was made a surveyor of customs, and on the death of Tate he became poet laureate. He was also appointed clerk of the council to the prince of Wales, and the list of preferments was closed by his nomination by Lord-Chancellor Parker (5th May 1718) as secretary of presentations in Chancery. He died 6th December 1718, and was buried in the south cross of Westminster Abbey. By his first wife, a daughter of Mr Parsons, one of the auditors of the revenue, he left a son John; and by his second wife, Anne, the daughter of Joseph Devenish of a Dorsetshire family, he had an only daughter, Charlotte, born in 1718, who married Henry Fane, a younger brother of Thomas, eighth earl of Westmoreland. The burials of mother and daughter are recorded in Colonel Chester’s Registers of Westminster Abbey.
Rowe’s tragedies were marked by passionate feeling set off by a graceful diction, and were well adapted for stage effect. If The Fair Penitent and Jane Shore have been expelled from the stage, their historic reputation and their style will repay perusal.
Among Rowe’s other literary efforts may be mentioned an edition of the works of Shakespeare (1709), for which he received from Lintot the bookseller the sum of £36, 10s., a rate of pay not out of proportion to the labour which was bestowed upon the task. At the time of his death he had also finished a translation of Lucan’s Pharsalia, a work then much praised and not yet superseded by any competitor. Rowe’s minor poems were beneath the level of his age. An edition of his works was published in 1720 under the care of Mr (afterwards Bishop) Newton. His translation of Lucan was edited by Dr Welwood.
