As has been noted, “Widowers’ Houses,” Shaw’s first play, was completed
in 1892. It was given its initial performance during that year at the
Royalty Theater, London, by the Independent Theater Company, and made
a rather strenuous success. “The socialists and independents,” says
Shaw, “applauded me furiously on principle; the ordinary play-going
first-nighters hooted me frantically on the same ground; I, being
at that time in some practice as what might be unpolitely called a
mob-orator, made a speech before the curtain; the newspapers discussed
the play for a whole fortnight, not only in the ordinary theatrical
notices and criticisms, but in leading articles and letters; and
finally the text of the play was published, with an introduction by
Mr. Grein (the manager of the Independent Company), an amusing account
by Mr. Archer of the original collaboration, and a long preface and
several elaborate controversial appendices in the author’s most
energetically egotistical fighting style.”
“The Philanderer” was written in 1893, also for the Independent
Theater, and “Mrs. Warren’s Profession” was completed the same year.
The former was withdrawn because it was found well-nigh impossible to
unearth actors capable of understanding it sufficiently to play it, and
the latter remained in the manager’s desk because the virtuous English
play-censor forbade its performance. Nine years later--January 12,
1902--it was presented privately by the Stage Society.
In 1894 a group of philanthropic play-goers, convinced that the dramas
of the day were intolerable, financed a series of special performances
at the Avenue Theater, London. The second play presented was Shaw’s
“Arms and the Man.” It was given its premiere April 21, and ran until
July 7. Shaw, in his preface to the second volume of “Plays Pleasant
and Unpleasant” enters upon an elaborate account of its receipts and
the philosophy thereof. During its brief season the Londoners paid
$8,500 to see it and the cost of presenting it, counting salaries,
rents, lights, advertising, and royalties, was nearly $25,000. Soon
afterwards Richard Mansfield presented the play in the United States
and it made a very fair success. It is in the Mansfield repertoire
even to-day, and now and then there is a matinée performance of it.
But apparently the public does not very vigorously demand it. In
translation it has been done in Germany.
“The Man of Destiny” was written in 1895. Two years later it was
given one performance at Croydon, England. Then it slumbered until
the last months of 1904, when Arnold Daly played it in New York as an
after-piece to “Candida.” Since then his company has appeared in it in
most of the large cities of the United States. “Candida” and “You Never
Can Tell” were written in 1896. The former was first played by the
Independent Theater Company, during a tour of the English provinces, in
1897. Arnold Daly, scraping together $300, presented it, in association
with Winchell Smith, at the Berkeley Lyceum, a diminutive theater in
West 45th street, New York, in 1904. The success of the drama was so
great that before long Daly found himself a Broadway star under the
management of Liebler & Co., and at present it seems likely that Shaw’s
plays will serve to keep him in the public eye for a good while to
come.
Shaw wrote a one-act piece, “How He Lied to Her Husband,” for his
young American interpreter, and when it was presented in New York, in
the fall of 1904, it made a great stir. “You Never Can Tell,” which
had been withdrawn by Shaw after being placed in rehearsal in London,
was given at the Garrick Theater by Daly at the conclusion of the run
of “Candida.” The two volumes of “Plays Pleasant and Unpleasant” were
published in 1898. They included “Widowers’ Houses,” “The Philanderer,”
“Mrs. Warren’s Profession,” “Arms and the Man,” “You Never Can Tell,”
“Candida,” and “The Man of Destiny”--not to speak of a 37-page preface
dealing with a vast multitude of subjects.
V
“The Devil’s Disciple,” the first of the “Three Plays for Puritans,”
was written early in 1897. Richard Mansfield presented it in New York
in the fall of that year and it made an excellent success. Like “Arms
and the Man” it is still in his repertoire--pretty far down in the
trunk, it may be mentioned in passing, with many other plays atop of
it. In October, 1899, Murray Carson’s company played it for a few weeks
at Kensington, near London. “Cæsar and Cleopatra” was written in 1898,
and “Capt. Brassbound’s Conversion” the next year. The “Three Plays
for Puritans” were published in 1900. “The Admirable Bashville, or
Constancy Rewarded” was given by the Stage Society at the Imperial
Theatre in 1903. Shaw evolved it from the fragments of “Cashel Byron’s
Profession” to protect his rights in the latter, an unauthorized
dramatization having been made for an American pugilist-actor. The play
was printed as an appendix to the second English edition of “Cashel
Byron’s Profession.”
“Man and Superman” was written in 1902, and published the next year,
with a gigantic preface, and “The Revolutionist’s Handbook and Pocket
Companion” as an appendix. Preface, play, and appendix make a volume
of 244 closely-printed pages. The drama saw the light on the evening
of May 23, 1905, at the Court Theater, London. Granville Barker, made
up to resemble Shaw, played the role of John Tanner, and Miss Lillian
McCarthy was the Ann Whitefield. May 21 and 22 there were special
performances of the play by the Stage Society, and in September, 1905,
Robert Loraine and his company presented it in New York. The third act
with the scene of Don Juan in Hell was omitted. “John Bull’s Other
Island” was completed in 1904, and presented at six special matinees at
the Court Theater by the Stage Society in the fall of that year. “Major
Barbara” was written in 1905.
Shaw’s two critical tracts, “The Perfect Wagnerite” and “The
Quintessence of Ibsenism” were published in 1888 and 1891,
respectively. His last scholastic manifesto, “The Common Sense of
Municipal Training” was issued in 1904. A remarkable essay, “On Going
to Church,” which appeared originally in the _Savoy Quarterly_--Arthur
Symons’ journal--in 1896, was reprinted early in 1905, and attained
a large sale. In the late ’80’s, in an English periodical, there
appeared his celebrated answer to Max Nordau’s book, “Degeneration.” In
the opinion of some of his admirers this is, by far, the best of his
controversial works, but, unfortunately, it has not been reprinted in
permanent form.
“When Arnold Daly visited Shaw,” says Gustav Kobbé, “he found several
indications that cynicism and Fabian socialism are not unprofitable.
Shaw lives in large apartments in the New Reform Club, overlooking
the Thames embankment, and he has a country place at Welwin, too....
There is no sham in the interior of his places of abode. There is a
complete absence of the cheap æsthetic or of superfluous ornamentation.
Simplicity of outline distinguishes such ornaments as there are.
Handles, incrustations and the like are eschewed. Shaw explained to
Daly that he wished nothing in his abode that would collect dust. Even
rugs are tabooed.... Daly did not find the author a _poseur_, but
simply a man who was not an ordinary man....”
That Shaw has a keen eye to business a great many aspiring managers
have discovered. He demands a royalty of 15 per cent. of the gross
receipts of his plays--considerably more than all but the most
famous dramatists receive--and is careful and unsentimental in his
negotiations. That he is now basking in the sun of prosperity is
very probable. Saving only Shakespeare, no English author was better
represented in the productions of the winter of 1904–5. In addition
Shaw is much in demand as a lecturer and has no difficulty in finding
a publisher for whatever he chooses to write. In 1898 he inherited the
entailed estate of his maternal grandfather, Walter Bagnall Gurley. He
was married the same year to Miss Charlotte Frances Payne-Townshend.
“Who’s Who” says that Shaw’s favorite exercises are swimming and
cycling and that his recreation is “anything except sport.” He is tall,
lanky, and wears a shaggy, red beard. He affects loose fitting flannel
shirts and heaps his curses upon the dress suit. He is a vegetarian,
a socialist, and many other things of a heterodox, fearsome sort. He
uses the typewriter in preference to a pen, even for correspondence. He
has travelled in Europe and the Levant, and may soon come to America.
He refuses to use apostrophes in such words as don’t and can’t, and
affects thin spacing, after the German style, instead of italics, to
emphasize words. “Last season,” says the sapient Mr. Daly, “he was a
social freak; now he is a legitimate amuser (sic!) of the people.”
And so much for George Bernard Shaw.