William Congreve was an English playwright, satirist and poet of the Restoration period, best known for comedies of manners such as The Way of the World (1700) and Love for Love (1695). Before his plays made his name in the 1690s, he was an apprentice to the poet John Dryden, and his later work includes The Mourning Bride (1697). Congreve wrote for the stage only until 1700, and when he died in London in 1729 he was buried at Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey.
