Description: Exclusive to Penguin Classics: the definitive text of Shaw's volume of "pleasant" plays, Arms and the Man, Candida, The Man of Destiny, and You Never Can Tell-part of the official Bernard Shaw Library One of Bernard Shaw's most glittering comedies, Arms and the Man is a burlesque of Victorian attitudes to heroism, war and empire. In the contrast between Bluntschli, the mercenary soldier, and the brave leader, Sergius, the true nature of valour is revealed. Shaw mocks deluded idealism in Candida, when a young poet becomes infatuated with the wife of a Socialist preacher. The Man of Destiny is a witty war of words between Napoleon and a "strange lady," while in the exuberant farce You Never Can Tell a divided family is reunited by chance. Although Shaw intended Plays Pleasant to be gentler comedies than those in their companion volume, Plays Unpleasant, their prophetic satire is sharp and provocative. This is the definitive text prepared under the editorial supervision of Dan H. Laurence. The volume includes Shaw's Preface of 1898. George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) is one of the world's greatest literary figures. Born in Dublin, Ireland, he left school at fourteen and in 1876 went to London, where he began his literary career with a series of unsuccessful novels. In 1884 he became a founder of the Fabian Society, the famous British socialist organization. After becoming a reviewer and drama critic, he published a study of the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen in 1891 and became determined to create plays as he felt Ibsen did: to shake audiences out of their moral complacency and to attack social problems. However, Shaw was an irrepressible wit, and his plays are as entertaining as they are socially provocative. Basically shy, Shaw created a public persona for himself: G.B.S., a bearded eccentric, crusading social critic, antivivisectionist, language reformer, strict vegetarian, and renowned public speaker. The author of fifty-three plays, hundreds of essays, reviews, and letters, and several books, Shaw is best known for Widowers' Houses, Mrs. Warren's Profession, Arms and the Man, Caesar and Cleopatra, Man and Superman, Major Barbara, Pygmalion, Heartbreak House, and Saint Joan. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1925. Dan H. Laurence (series editor; 1920-2008) was series editor for the works of George Bernard Shaw in Penguin. Formerly a New York University faculty member, Mr. Laurence left his tenured position in 1970 to dedicated his life to the collection and curation of Shaw's life, work, and letters. He served as the official literary advisor to Shaw's estate and published four volumes of his correspondence. W. J. McCormack (introducer) is a professor of literary history at Goldsmith's College, London. Plays PleasantIntroduction Chronology Preface Arms and the Man: An Anti-romantic Comedy Candida: A Mystery The Man of Destiny: A Fictitious Paragraph of History You Never Can Tell: A Comedy Composition and Cast Lists Principal Works of Bernard Shaw
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EAN: 9780140437942
UPC: 9780140437942
ISBN: 9780140437942
MPN: N/A
Book Title: Plays Pleasant
Number of Pages: 336 Pages
Language: English
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Publication Year: 2003
Item Height: 0.8 in
Topic: Drama, European / English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh
Illustrator: Yes
Genre: Literary Criticism, Drama, Literary Collections
Item Weight: 9 Oz
Item Length: 7.8 in
Author: George Bernard Shaw
Item Width: 5 in
Format: Uk-B Format Paperback