Comprehensive information and links about George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw (July 26, 1856 – November 2, 1950) was an Irish playwright and winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1925. After those of William Shakespeare, Shaw's plays are some of the most widely produced in English language theater.

Biography

Born in Dublin, Ireland to rather poor Protestant parents, Shaw was educated at Wesley College, Dublin and moved to London during the 1870s to embark on his literary career. He wrote five novels, all of which were rejected, before finding his first success as a music critic on the newspaper. In the meantime he had become involved in politics, and served as a local councillor in the St Pancras district of London for several years from 1897. He was a noted socialist who took a leading role in the Fabian Society.

In 1895, he became the drama critic of the , and this was the first step in his progress towards a lifetime's work as a dramatist. In 1898, he married an Irish heiress, Charlotte Payne-Townshend. His first successful play, , was produced in the same year. He followed this up with a series of classic comedy-dramas, including (1913). After World War I, during which he was a staunch pacifist, he produced more serious dramas, including (1923). A characteristic of Shaw's published plays is the lengthy prefaces that accompany them. In these essays, Shaw wrote more about his usually controversial opinions on the issues touched by the plays than about the plays themselves. Some prefaces are much longer than the actual play.

The political turmoil in his native country did not leave him untouched. He is said to have commented regarding the Easter Rising that not enough slum homes were destroyed that could have been rebuilt, and he campaigned against the executions of the rebel leaders. Shaw became a personal friend of the Cork-born IRA leader Michael Collins, whom he invited to his home for dinner while Collins was negotiating the Anglo-Irish Treaty with Lloyd-George in London. After Collins' assassination in 1922, Shaw sent a personal message of condolence to one of Collins' sisters.

Shaw's correspondence with Mrs. Patrick Campbell was adapted for the stage by Jerome Kilty as . His letters to another prominent actress, Ellen Terry, have also been published and dramatised.

By the time of his death, Shaw was not only a household name in Britain, but a world figure. His ironic wit endowed the language with the adjective "Shavian", to refer to such clever observations as "England and America are two countries divided by a common language." [1]

Concerned about the inconsistency of English spelling, he willed a portion of his wealth to fund the creation of a new phonemic alphabet for the English language. On his death bed, he did not have much money to leave so no effort was made to start such a project. However, his estate began to earn significant royalties from the rights to , a musical based on the play, became a hit. It then became clear that the will was so badly worded that the relatives had grounds to challenge the will and in the end an out of court settlement granted a small portion of the money to promoting a new alphabet. This became known as the Shavian alphabet. The National Gallery of Ireland also received a substantial donation.

Shaw had a long time friendship with G. K. Chesterton, the Catholic-convert British writer, and there are many humorous stories about their complicated relationship. Another great friend was the composer Edward Elgar.

Shaw is the only person ever to have won both a Nobel Prize (Literature in 1925) and an Academy Award (Best Screenplay for Pygmalion in 1938).

From 1906 until his death in 1950 at the age of 94 from natural causes, Shaw lived at Shaw's Corner in the small village of Ayot St Lawrence, Hertfordshire. The house is now a National Trust property, open to the public.

The Shaw Theatre, Euston Road, London was opened in 1971 to honour G.B. Shaw.

Vegetarianism

George Bernard Shaw was a noted vegetarian. The following was taken from the archives of the Vegetarian UK:

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The Summer of 1946 seems to have been a season of anniversaries and memorials. The Vegetarian Society itself was looking forward to its 100th anniversary and giving its members advance warnings of celebratory plans.

But the big story of the July issue of The Vegetarian Messenger was the tribute to George Bernard Shaw, celebrating his 90th birthday on the 26th of that month. He had, at that time, been a vegetarian for 66 years and was commended as one of the great thinkers and dramatists of his era. "No writer since Shakespearean times has produced such a wealth of dramatic literature, so superb in expression, so deep in thought and with such dramatic possibilities as Shaw." The writer was a staunch vegetarian, anti-vivisectionist and opponent of cruel sports.

Socialism and Political Beliefs

Shaw had a vision (letter to Henry James in 1, 17, 1909): “I, as a Socialist, have had to preach, as much as anyone, the enormous power of the environment. We can change it; we must change it; there is absolutely no other sense in life than the task of changing it. What is the use of writing plays, what is the use of writing anything, if there is not a will which finally moulds chaos itself into a race of gods.” Shaw held that each class worked towards its own ends, and that those from the upper echelons had won the struggle; for him, the working class had failed in promoting their interests effectively, making Shaw highly critical of the democratic system of his day. The writing of Shaw, such as Major Barbara and Pygmalion, has a background theme of class struggle. An awareness of his socialism is required to understand the man and his plays.

Shaw’s second labor—after theater—was in support of socialism. In 1882 Henry George’s lecture on land nationalization gave depth and direction to Shaw’s political ideology. Shortly thereafter he applied to join the Social Democratic Federation. Its leader H. H. Hyndman introduced him to the works of Karl Marx. Instead in May of 1884 he joined the newly-formed Fabian Society. He played a pivotal role with the Fabian Society and wrote a number of their pamphlets. He argued that property was theft and for an equitable distribution of land and capital. Shaw favored gradualism over revolution. He was involved with the formation of the Labour Party. For a common sense statement of his position read . A second source for Shaw’s radical ideas are the often lengthy prefaces to his plays.

Despite the fact that he identified as being a democratic socialist, in the 1930s Shaw approved of the regime of Stalin and also made some ambiguous statements that are often interpreted as being pro-Hitler. In 1945, his preface to the play staked a claim that the majority of the victims of the Nazi extermination camps had in fact died of "overcrowding". However, he also stated that Hitler had become a "mad messiah" over time: Shaw contrasted this with the situation in the Soviet Union where, according to Shaw, "Stalin... made good by doing things better and much more promptly than parliaments". Shaw also made numerous anti-semitic comments at this time, although the extent to which he was merely being ironic or provocative is unclear. His strongly favorable view of Stalin and the Soviet Union is quite evident, but often goes unremarked in discussions of his work.

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man.""I can forgive Alfred Nobel for inventing dynamite, but only a fiend in human form could have invented the Nobel Prize.""The main difference between the opposition of Islam to Hinduism and the opposition between Protestant and Catholic is that the Catholic persecutes as fiercely as the Protestant when he has the power; but Hinduism cannot persecute, because all the Gods---and what goes deeper, the no Gods---are to be found in its Temples.""The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality."(To a woman who wrote to him that she wanted to have children with him because, she was beautiful and he was very smart. Therefore, their children would be smart and beautiful.) "What if our children are as ugly as I am and as silly as you are?""No man ever believes that the Bible means what it says: He is always convinced that it says what he means.""I have always held the religion of Muhammad in high estimation because of its wonderful vitality. It is the only religion which appears to me to possess that assimilating capacity to the changing phase of existence which can make itself appeal to every age. I have studied him - the wonderful man and in my opinion far from being an anti-Christ, he must be called the Saviour of Humanity. I believe that if a man like him were to assume the dictatorship of the modern world, he would succeed in solving its problems in a way that would bring it the much needed peace and happiness: I have prophesied about the faith of Muhammad that it would be acceptable to the Europe of tomorrow as it is beginning to be acceptable to the Europe of today.""This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; the being a force of nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community and as long as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can.""It is impossible for an Englishman to open his mouth without making some other Englishman hate or despise him."The Shaw Festival at Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, Canada. A town and theatre dedicated to staging the plays and dramas of George Bernard Shaw.Shaw Collection in the University of Guelph Library, Archival and Special Collections, holds more than 3,000 items related to his writings and career