George Bernard Shaw(1856-1950)
- Writer
- Director
- Actor
The Anglo-Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950), winner of
the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1925, acquired a reputation as the
greatest dramatist in the English language during the first half of the
20th Century for the plays he had written at the height of his
creativity from "Mrs. Warren's Profession" in 1893 to "The Apple Cart"
in 1929. His works have been revived on Broadway from 1894 to 2010. His
most famous work in the 21st Century is
My Fair Lady (1964), the musical
adaptation of Pygmalion (1938).
A Shavian drama (his reputation was so great, he had his own adjective
ascribed to his works) had a biting social critique leavened by humor.
According to his Nobel Prize citation, "His ideas were those of a
somewhat abstract logical radicalism; hence they were far from new, but
they received from him a new definiteness and brilliance. In him these
ideas combined with a ready wit, a complete absence of respect for any
kind of convention, and the merriest humor - all gathered together in
an extravagance which has scarcely ever before appeared in literature."
He was a major international celebrity and a force in British politics,
being a charter member of the Fabian Society. The Fabians were
committed to democratic socialism, that is, using parliamentary
mechanisms to encourage a gradual adoption of socialist policies
through political reform rather than revolution.
the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1925, acquired a reputation as the
greatest dramatist in the English language during the first half of the
20th Century for the plays he had written at the height of his
creativity from "Mrs. Warren's Profession" in 1893 to "The Apple Cart"
in 1929. His works have been revived on Broadway from 1894 to 2010. His
most famous work in the 21st Century is
My Fair Lady (1964), the musical
adaptation of Pygmalion (1938).
A Shavian drama (his reputation was so great, he had his own adjective
ascribed to his works) had a biting social critique leavened by humor.
According to his Nobel Prize citation, "His ideas were those of a
somewhat abstract logical radicalism; hence they were far from new, but
they received from him a new definiteness and brilliance. In him these
ideas combined with a ready wit, a complete absence of respect for any
kind of convention, and the merriest humor - all gathered together in
an extravagance which has scarcely ever before appeared in literature."
He was a major international celebrity and a force in British politics,
being a charter member of the Fabian Society. The Fabians were
committed to democratic socialism, that is, using parliamentary
mechanisms to encourage a gradual adoption of socialist policies
through political reform rather than revolution.