(14) George Bernard Shaw
The Victorian Drama and Theatre
- theatre = a flourishing and pop. institution
- => wide appeal x but: limited artistic achievement
- comedy of Victorian pretence and hypocrisy: G. B. Shaw’s ‘problem plays' on difficult social issues,
infl. by the socially controversial plays of Henrik Ibsen (1828 – 1906) x O. Wilde’s comedies
- infl. of drama in the novel:
- > C. Dickens composed many scenes in his novels with theatrical techniques
- > W. M. Thackeray repres. himself as the puppetmaster of his characters + employed the stock gestures
and expressions of melodramatic acting in his illustr. in Vanity Fair
- > + A. Tennyson, R. Browning, and H. James = unsuccessful playwrights
T h e 2 0 th C e n t u r y D r a m a
Prelude to Modern Drama:
- > O. Wilde’s witty drawing-room comedies, with verbal play + serious reflections on social, political,
even feminist issues beneath
- > G. B. Shaw’s discussion plays, with a provocative paradox to challenge the complacency of the
audience
Irish Drama:
- the 1st major theatrical movement of the 20th c. orig. in Dublin
- (I) The Irish Literary Theatre (1899) = founded by W. B. Yeats, A. Gregory, George Moore, and Edward
Martyn; inaugurated by W. B. Yeats’s The Countess Cathleeen > (II) The Irish National Theatre (1902)
= maintained a permanent all-Irish company > (III) The Abbey Theatre (1904) = moved to a building of
that name
- > J(ohn) M(illington) Synge’s use of the speech and imagination of Ir. country people; W. B. Yeats’s use
of the themes from old Ir. legends; and Sean O’Casey’s use of the Ir. civil war as a background for plays
combining tragic melodrama, humour, and irony
English Drama:
- > T. S. Eliot’s ritual poetic drama, incl. Murder in the Cathedral + his plays combining contemporary
social chatter with profound relig. symbolism, incl. The Cocktail Party > uneven
Modern Drama Highlights:
(a) Ibsenism (1890s):
- < the Norwegian dramatist H. Ibsen = then perceived as a critic of middle-class society x rather than now
as a poetic dramatist experimenting with symbolic modes of expression
- > a sentimental social comedy, highly pop. in its time: Noel Coward (1899 – 1973), J(ames) M(atthew)
Barrie (1860 – 1937), & oth.
- => typically produced in the London West End Theatre
(b) radio drama (1940s):
- wartime verse plays written for and commissioned by the BBC radio: Louis MacNeice, & oth.
(c) absurd drama (1950s +):
- < S. Beckett’s Waiting for Godot (1948 Fr., 1953 E), an apparent lack of plot > focus on language as ‘the
main instrument of man’s refusal to accept the world as it is’
- => typically produced in the Royal Court Theatre
(d) the Angry Young Men (1950s – 60s):
- > John’s Osborne’s Look Back in Anger (1956), technically traditional x but: the novelty in its nonmetropolitan setting and the emotional cruelty and directionless angst of Jimmy Porter, the prototype of
the E rebel without a cause
- > technically more adventurous: J. Osborne’s The Entertainer (1957), a challenging allegory of the
protagonist’s declining fortunes as a music-hall artist and of the changes in E society; and his Luther
(1960), a study of the historical rebel with a tangible cause
(e) the kitchen-sink drama x symbolic drama (1950s – 60s):
- new challenges of cinema and TV > the response of the Br. theatre with changes
- new dramatists esp. from lower middle-class/working-class, educated on state grants, employed in odd
jobs (kitchens, etc.), often jobs with the theatre (actors)
- > (a) the naturalist kitchen-sink drama (1950s): Arnold Wesker’s trilogy Chicken Soup with Barley
(1958), & oth.
- > x (b) the drama of language and symbolism: Harold Pinter’s ‘comedies of menace’, incl. The Room
(1957), a study of working-class stress and inarticulate anxiety; The Dumb Waiter (1960), a black farce;
and The Homecoming (1965), a comic study of middle-class escape from working-class mores
- => typically produced in the Royal Court Theatre
(f) black comedy (1960s):
- self-conscious theatricality to show theatre as different from film and TV
- > Joe Orton’s parodies of oth. forms of theatre, incl. What the Butler Saw (1969), a farce ending even
with a deus ex machina, & oth.
- > Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1968), a parodic homage to the verbal
texture and theatrical technique of S. Beckett; his The Real Inspector Hound (1968), a pastiche of the
murder mystery, blurring the gap btw proscenium and audience; his Travesties (1974), a study of the role
of memory and imagination in the creative process, incl. time-slips and memory lapses; and his Arcadia
(1955), an account of a Romantic poet and his modern critics occupying the same physical space x but:
never reaching intellectual common ground
End-of-Century Condition of Drama:
- Lord Chamberlain’s abolition of the state censorship of plays (1968) > emergence of controversial
political, social, and sexual issues in plays: Edward Bond’s Lear (1971), typical of new plays combining
soaring lyrical language and realistic violence; & oth.
- a new trend of collab. and group development of plays
- women pushing their way onto mainstream stages: Caryl Churchill’s Top Girls (1982), the discourse
aspiring to reproduce the ebb and flow of normal speech; & oth.
- the opening of the new National Theatre Complex on London’s South Bank (1976) = a high-water mark
> drama recession due to TV (1980s – 90s)
G(eorge) B(ernard) Shaw (1856 – 1950)
Life:
- b. in Dublin x but: went to London to become a novelist, wrote 5 unsuccessful novels
- studied Karl Marx’s (1818 – 83 [= a Ger. philos., political economist, social revolutionary, and cofounder of Marxism with Friedrich Engels]) Das Kapital (1867) and Richard Wagner’s (1813 – 83)
opera Tristan and Isolde (1865):
(a) socialism = the answer to society’s problems: joined the Fabian Society = a socialist organisation
(b)  a public speaker, author of public pronouncements and tracts: advocated gradual reform rather
then rev., with wit absent from most oth. political writing of the time
(c) met and befriended William Archer (1856 – 1924 [= a Scott. journalist and critic])
(d)  an art critic: pioneered a new standard of wit and judgement of reviewing
- a music critic: championed the operas of R. Wagner
- a drama critic: championed the plays of the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen (1828 – 1906) [see his
The Quintessence of Ibsenism (1891)]
- a public character: experienced historical changes of the last ½ of the 19th c. / the 1st ½ of the 20th c. and
pronounced on them in a witty epigrammatic style
- a literary celebrity: used his publicity to advocate his social ideas x O. Wilde used his to define his
aesthetic POV
- a radical in many aspects: vegetarian, non-smoker, non-drinker, advocate of women’s rights, the
abolition of private property, and the simplification of E spelling and punctuation
Work:
(a)
-
author of more than 50 plays
content:
< H. Ibsen > men-mastering, no-nonsense, and strong-willed women characters
< C. Dickens > tends to comedy, aspires to a dramatic reflection of D.’s comic energy, social diversity,
and political observation
- set predominantly in the En. of the turn of the 20th c.
- fuses elements of socialism, science, and philos. x but: not as much didactic as instructive
- ‘a drama of ideas’ = the characters argue their POVs to justify their social positions: the prostitute of Mrs
Warren’s Profession (1893), the munitions manufacturer in Major Barbara (1905), etc.
- his history illuminating, present reforming, and future exciting: his intellectual confidence lacks in the
cautious, agnostic, and depressive writing of most of his contemporaries
(b) form:
- 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
- produces dialogues of rhetorical brilliance
- reverses plot conventions, attacks conventional moralism of the audience, and moves the audience to an
uncomfortable sympathy with the POVs and characters violating traditional assumptions
- orig.: difficulty getting his plays performed  publ. in a book form with a didactic preface as Plays
Pleasant and Unpleasant (1898)
- then: performed in the Royal Court Theatre = the centre for avant-garde drama in London
-  received the Nobel Prize for Lit. (1925)
The Quintessence of Ibsenism (1891):
- explains his reasons for admiring H. Ibsen
- defines the kind of drama he wanted to write
Widower’s Houses (1892):
- = his 1st play
- criticises the slum landlordism
The Philanderer (1893):
- > forbidden by the Lord Chamberlain’s censorship
Mrs Warren’s Profession (1893):
- conc.: the contemp. women’s question of the lack of employment occasions
- contrasts the future professional career of an educated, would-be-independent woman x the oldest
profession of F prostitution: argues for the propriety of both vocations
- preface: prostitution caused not by F depravity x but: by underpaying, undervaluing, and overworking
women
- women forced to resort to prostitution  infamous of society to offer such alternatives
- internal tensions: juxtaposes the liberated daughter Vivie x her brothel-keeping mother
- concl.: no reconciliation, compromise, or empty gestures of feminine solidarity x but: a slammed door
with an isolated Vivie happily engrossed in her work
- > the 1st legal public performances in E allowed only in the y. after his receiving the Nobel Prize
Arms and the Man: An Anti-Romantic Comedy (1894):
- = a ‘pleasant’ play for the commercial theatre
- challenges ideas of soldierly and masculine heroism
Candida: A Mystery (1894):
- = a ‘pleasant’ play
- turns H. Ibsen’s A Doll’s House (1879 [= criticises the traditional roles of men and women in Victorian
marriage]) upside down in the context of a Christian Socialist family
The Devil’s Disciple (1896)
Caesar and Cleopatra (1898)
The Perfect Wagnerite (1898):
- < R. Wagner’s innovatory music-dramas of ‘The Ring Cycle’ (1848 – 74 [= The Ring of the Nibelung, a
series of 4 epic music dramas based on elements of Germanic paganism])
- transforms W.’s mythology into an analyses of modern realities
- ‘the dwarfs, giants and gods’ = ‘dramatisations of the three main orders of men’
(a) dwarfs = ‘the instinctive, predatory, lustful, greedy people’
(b) giants = ‘the patient, toiling, stupid,…money-worshipping people’
(c) gods = ‘the intellectual, moral, talented people’
- < further develops the idea in his Heartbreak House (1919)
You Never Can Tell (1899):
- = a ‘pleasant’ play
- allows for the victory of a new generation over the old
Man and Superman (1903):
- < Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s (1756 – 91 [= an Austrian composer]) Don Giovanni (1787)
- set in an infernal afterlife
- transforms the play’s characters into those of Don Giovanni in a vast post-Nietzschean argument
John Bull’s Other Island (1904):
- = one of his rare direct treatments of Ir.
Major Barbara (1905):
- conc.: the idea of the future reconstruction of society by a power-manipulating minority
- contrasts a strong-willed father x his equally strong-minded daughter
Androcles and the Lion (1912)
Pygmalion (1912):
- conc.: the developing relationship btw a ‘creator’ x his ‘creation’
- < possibly shares this ‘grotesque’ idea with C. Dickens’ Great Expectations
- > the basis of the musical My Fair Lady (1956)
Heartbreak House (1919):
- the title: from its subtle series of encounters btw characters each of which has to come to terms with
disillusion and some kind of ‘heartbreak’
- < develops the theme of 3 contending orders of men of his The Perfect Wagnerite
- concl.: the god-like survivors destroy the oth. 2 orders
Back to Methuselah (1920)
Saint Joan (1923):
- celebrates the recent canonisation of the Fr. military heroine Joan of Arc (1412 – 31) x but: scarcely in a
churchy way
- Joan = a self-aware, self-asserting woman  ‘saintly’ not in the sentimental sense x but: by merit of the
effects she has on oth. and in her willingness to give her life for the freedom opened up to her by her
convictions