Alfred Sutro

Alfred Sutro OBE (7 August 1863 – 11 September 1933) was an English dramatist, writer and translator. In addition to a succession of successful plays of his own in the first quarter of the 20th century, Sutro made the first English translations of works by the Belgian writer Maurice Maeterlinck.

Life and career Sutro was born in London, the third and youngest son of Sigismund Sutro, a medical practitioner and authority on continental spas and their cures. Sutro senior, who was of German and Spanish Sephardic ancestry, had come to England from Germany as a young man and become a British subject. Alfred's grandfather was a rabbi.

Sutro was educated at the City of London School and in Brussels. Sutro's other Maeterlinck translations, some made jointly with his friend Alexander Teixeira de Mattos, include Aglavaine and Selysette, Joyzelle, The Life of the White Ant, The Buried Temple, Monna Vanna, The Death of Tintagiles, and The Magic of the Stars.

Sutro's own work was chiefly as a playwright. After many false starts he achieved a moderate success in 1895 with The Chili Widow, an adaptation of a French work, made jointly with Arthur Bourchier. It ran for 423 performances, and established Sutro among the leading English dramatists.

Sutro also published a volume of stories (The Foolish Virgins, 1904), a collection of sketches (About Women, 1931), and a volume of memoirs, (Celebrities and Simple Souls, 1933).

Sutro died after a few days' illness at his home in Witley, Surrey, on 11 September 1933. His widow died the following year. They had no children.