[2][3] Holman was brought up on a farm in North Yorkshire and worked as a bookshop assistant at Paddington station for three years after leaving school before receiving an Arts Council bursary in 1974.
"[5] Unlike more obviously politically committed writers – for example Edward Bond, Caryl Churchill or David Hare – Holman writes neither issue plays nor ones which lead audiences to predetermined ideological ends.
[9] Critical reaction has wavered from the enthusiastic and respectful to the bemused,[9] the latter especially when his 1984 play Other Worlds featured a talking monkey.
[1] In 1999, his trilogy of short plays Making Noise Quietly was revived by the Oxford Stage Company in the West End at the Whitehall Theatre.
Holman was an acknowledged inspiration for some of the younger generation of British playwrights, including David Eldridge and Simon Stephens.