Edward Rose was born in Swaffham, Norfolk, on 7 August 1849, son of Dr Caleb Rose, F.R.C.S., M.R.C.P. and his first wife, Isabella Morse. He attended Islington Proprietary School and Ipswich Grammar School. He worked in the solicitors firm Cobbold and Yarrington (in Ipswich) for four years, from 1868 to 1872. In 1872 he moved to London.

He began writing plays in 1869, and first had a play produced in London in 1872. (Our Farm) He was a regular contributor to the Illustrated London News, specifically, the English Homes series, and was the theatre critic for the Sunday Times starting in 1894 and continuing until at least 1897. His greatest success as a playwright came in 1896 with the premiere of his adaption of The Prisoner of Zenda. He later adapted other works of Anthony Hope, but none reached the same level of success.

He married Elizabeth Ann Gould, and had two daughters, Lucy and Dorothy. His elder daughter, Lucy, died when she was ten, and in her memory Rose endowed a research post at the London School of Economics and paid for the education of a board school girl.

He served for a while as the Vice-President of the Playgoer's Club, and was a member of the Fabian Society. He "took an active interest in the founding of Letchworth Garden City."

In 1902, Rose published The Rose Reader "a new way of teaching to read," that used only words that were spelled the way they sounded, in order to develop the love of reading before complicating the process.

Edward Rose died on December 31, 1904, at the age of 55.

Confusion with Edward Everett Rose

He is sometimes confused or conflated with Edward Everett Rose (1862—1939), an American dramatist also known for dramatizing novels, notably Richard Carvel and the Penrod stories of Booth Tarkington.