The White Liars/Black Comedy
by Peter Schaffer
31 Dec 1983
Peter Shaffer was born in 1926 in Liverpool and was moved to London in 1935, where he was educated at St. Paul's school. In 1944 he was conscripted for military servce, speding three years in the coal mines of Kent and Yorkshire. Shaffer resumed his education in 1948, winning a scholarship to Cambridge University. His first makor success was Five Finger Exercise, which won awards in both Britain and America. His other outstanding plays are Royal Hunt of the Sun, and epic about the conquest of Peru, and Equus, described by critics as 'Noble, moving and powerful.'