José Echegaray y Eizaguirre

José Echegaray y Eizaguirre (1832-1916), Spanish playwright and statesman, born in Madrid. He was a professor of mathematics and physics at the Madrid engineering school from 1854 to 1868. From 1868 to 1874 he served in several Spanish Cabinets as minister of commerce, education, and finance; he served as finance minister again in 1905. He first began writing plays in 1874 and wrote more than 60 dramas in prose and verse, most of the early works dealing with Romantic melancholy. His later works show the influence of Henrik Ibsen. In 1904 Echegaray shared the Nobel Prize for Literature with the Provençal poet Frédéric Mistral. Plays by Echegaray include Madman or Saint (1876; trans. 1912), The World and His Wife (1881; United States production, 1908), and Mariana (1892).