Shaw, George Bernard. (1856 - 1950).

W o r k

< influenced by such diverse personalities as Karl Marx, Richard Wagner, and Henrik Ibsen

- author of more than 50 plays, a socialist, drama critic, music critic, art critic, and a public speaker

- his plays fuse elements of socialism, science, and philosophy: attacks conventional moralism, makes his characters argue their points of view to justify themselves, and moves the audience to uncomfortable sympathy

- emphasises the discussion: makes play and discussion practically identical, makes the spectators themselves the persons of the drama, and the incidents of their own lives its incidents

- faced difficulties with getting his plays performed: published them in a book form with a didactic preface as Plays Pleasant and Unpleasant (1898)

> received the Nobel Prize for Literature (1925)

Widower’s Houses (1892):

- his first play, criticizes the slum landlordism

Mrs Warren’s Profession (1893):

- criticizes the lack of employment occasions for women

- contrasts the future professional career of an educated, would-be-independent woman x the oldest profession of female prostitution

- in the preface explains that prostitution is caused not by female depravity x but: by underpaying, undervaluing, and overworking women

Arms and the Man (1894) and Candida (1894):

- ‘pleasant’ plays for the commercial theatre

The Perfect Wagnerite (1898):

- transforms Wagner’s mythology from ‘The Ring Cycle’ into philosophical  analyses of modern realities

- dramatises the three main orders of men: ‘dwarfs’ (instinctive, lustful, and greedy), ‘giants’ (patient, toiling, and stupid), and ‘gods’ (intellectual, moral, and talented)

Major Barbara (1905):

- concerned with the idea of the future reconstruction of society by a power-manipulating minority

Pygmalion (1912):

- concerned with the relationship between a ‘creator’ x his ‘creation’

> became the basis of the musical My Fair Lady (1956)

Heartbreak House (1919):

- develops the theme of the three contending orders of men of The Perfect Wagnerite: the god-like survivors destroy the other two orders

Saint Joan (1923):

- celebrates the canonisation of Joan of Arc x but: renders Joan as a strong, self-aware, and self-asserting woman in an earthly way