Wesker, Arnold 1932-
English dramatist

He was born in London's East End, of Jewish immigrant parents, and left school at 14. His family background and attempts to earn a living are important ingredients of such plays as the Kahn family trilogy, Chicken Soup with Barley, Roots and I'm talking about Jerusalem (1958-60). Roots is an eloquent manifesto of Wesker's socialism: an aesthetic recipe for all which he attempted to put into practice by taking art to the workers through his Centre-42 (1961-70), which was situated in an old locomotive shed in Camden Town, London, and which was heavily involved with the trade union movement. Other plays include Chips with Everything (1962), The Four Seasons (1965) and Their Very Own and Golden City (1966), The Old Ones (1972) and Love Letters on Blue Paper (1978), originally written for television in 1976. He also wrote the essay collection Fears of Fragmentation (1970) and Words - as Definitions of Experience (1976). A one-woman play, Annie Wobbler (1984), was well received, and his plays were collected in five volumes in 1989-90, but so far his reputation rests firmly on his earliest works. Recent works include the plays Wild Spring (1992) and Tokyo (1994), the autobiography As Much As I Dare (1994) and The King's Daughters (1993), a collection of short stories.

Bibliography: J R Taylor, Anger and After (1962)