Rylands was born at the Down House, Tockington, Gloucestershire, to Thomas Kirkland Rylands, a land agent, and Bertha Nisbet Wolferstan (née Thomas).

While at Cambridge, he became a friend of John Maynard Keynes, also a student and Fellow at King’s.

He directed and acted in many productions for The Marlowe Society, and was chairman of the Cambridge Arts Theatre from 1946 to 1982.

[4] Rylands' 1939 Shakespeare anthology Ages of Man was the basis of John Gielgud's one-man show of the same title.

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