George Bernard Shaw, novelist and playwright, was born in Dublin in an impoverished middle-class family. As a boy he seldom saw his parents. His father was occupied in a business which was almost bankrupt, and his mother devoted all her time to musical interests. She had a beautiful voice; Bernard himself and his sister could sing well enough and there were, besides the piano, many other musical instruments Music came to play an important educative part in young Shaw’s life.

Shaw had a well-educated uncle, a clergyman with whom he read the classics. So when he entered school at the age of ten, he was much advanced an did better than all the other pupils in English composition. He didn’t like school because the school course of studies was dull for him. He left one school for another, and then another, but everywhere the dull textbooks were the same, and they could not rouse the boy’s interest. He educated himself by reading, and by studying foreign languages. At the age of fifteen Shaw went to work as a clerk. The monotonous daily routine, the endless figures, the feeling that he had become an insignificant part of a machine, all that alarmed the youth. In many things he was better informed than most of his fellow clerks.

Shakespeare, Byron, Shelley and many other great poets and writers had been read and reread by him. He could discuss art, for he had studied the best works at the National Gallery in Dublin. At his job he had mastered the problems of his work without any difficulty. Yet he was far from being happy.

Bernar Shaw felt that he had to leave and so in 1876 he said goodbye to Ireland and went to London, where his mother had been making a living by giving music lessons. In London he devoted much time to self-education and wrote music and dramatic critiques for various periodicals.

Bernard Shaw set out to become a novelist. Between 1879 and 1883 he wrote five long novels, which were rejected by all publishers. Thus he gave up writing novels.

He became a socialist in 1882 and took an active part in the socialist movement. At the British Museum reading-room he read Karl Marx in a French version. Though he admired their great influence on him, he failed to understand the necessity of a revolutionary reconstruction of the world.

In 1884 Bernard Shaw joined the Fabian Society, an organization of intellectuals. It was a reformist organization. They preached gradual transition from capitalism to socialism by means of reforms. On the eve of World War I Shaw experienced a deep ideological crisis. His faith in Fabian illusions was shattered considerably. His point of disagreement with the Fabians was their attitude to the war. Shaw set himself resolutely against the militarists and the military points of view.

Shaw gave up writing novels and turned to dramatic writing. He wrote his first play Widower’s Houses in 1892. It was the first of the three plays published in his first volume called Plays Unpleasant. The other two were The Philanderer (1893) and Mrs Warren’s Profession (1894). In the preface to his volume Shaw explained why he called them Plays Unpleasant. They discussed social problems of tremendous importance: the source of earning money by the “respectable bourgeoisie”, the miseries of the poor. Their dramatic power is used to make the audience face unpleasant facts.

The first performance of Bernard Shaw’s play Widower’s Houses was quite a sensation. He was attacked both by the public and the critics.

George Bernard Shaw was a reformer of the theatre. The English Theatre of the 19th century was a theater of primitive melodrama. Shaw opened the way for a new drama: a critical and realistic one. Shaw’s plays were serious plays which he called problem plays, full of topical problems of the day.

Shaw was the leader of the revolution against the theory of “art for art’s sake”. He demanded that art should serve to teach and he saw the theatre as a means of correction of public morals. With his plays Shaw tried to change the world while he entertained it. In 1895 he published some of his plays under the title of Plays Unpleasant – they include Arms and the Man (1894), The Man of Destiny (1895) and Candida (1894). The title of the plays is rather ironical: through the amusing situations and witty scenes with sparkling dialogues Bernard Shaw continued his criticism of bourgeois morals and ideals. He attacked militarism and war (Arms and the Man), showing their senselessness and cruelty, and dethroned Napoleon (The Man of Destiny).

The third volume of Shaw’s plays was called Three Plays for Puritans; these were Caesar and Cleopatra (1898), The Devil’s Disciple (1897) and Captain Brassbound’s Conversion (1899). The title of the third cycle has a double meaning: on the one hand the plays turn against English puritanism and hypocrisy, on the other hand they are directed against the decadent drama.

In 1912 Shaw wrote his most popular play Pygmalion, which scandalized the “respectble” public by using folk words which English usage considered vulgar.

By 1900 Shaw has established his reputation as a playwright. He wrote one play after another as well as books of criticism and pamphlets. Shaw’s plays deal with various problems: politics, science, religion, education and economics.

During World War I Shaw wrote long and daring articles protesting against the fighting governments and their war policy.

After the war Shaw’s political and social views underwent a gradual evolution. He reconsidered the idea of reforms and came to realize the role of the proletariat. His visit to the Soviet Union in 1931 impressed him greatly. He was fascinated by what he had seen there, but he did not understand the totalitarian nature of the Soviet regime.

Shaw was greatly interested in Russian culture. He highly appreciated and admired Leo Tolstoy, with whom he corresponded, and also Chekhov and Gorky.

Bernard Shaw was at the peak of his fame (1925) when he received the International Nobel Prize for Literature.

Shaw’s plays of the second period become still more complex, for the problems Shaw deals with are now more complicated and significant. The most powerful among the plays are The Apple Cart (1929) and Too True to Be Good (1931).

In his play The Apple Cart Shaw touches upon the theme of rivalry between the USA and England in the political arena. In his play Too True to Be Good Shaw dwells on the decay of the west society. Besides he connects the birth and growth of new progressive forces in the world with socialism in the Soviet Union.

Shaw’s plays are discussion plays full of witty paradoxes and brilliant dialogues. He regards the speeches of his characters not only as means to characterize them but also as a means of expressing his own point of view on this or that problem. Shaw mocks at bourgeois charity, satirizes businessmen and aristocrats. Each play is a responce to current events, a discussion of burning questions.

Shaw’s way of writing is very peculiar, grotesque. He says true things in such a way that at first one if not sure whether he is joking or serious. He makes a sort of game out of his jokes and witty words. Shaw called himself the “jester” of English society. A jester can say whatever he likes, no one can be offended with a jester’s jokes. So as a professional “joker” Shaw told English society some bitter truth which no one would have allowed him to say if he had not been England’s jester.

Bernard Shaw chose satire as a weapon to fight for his ideals, and thus he carried on and developed the best traditions of realism in English literature.

He died on November 2, 1950 at the age of 94.

Bernard Shaw’s best plays are highly appreciated in this country. They are staged in almost all the theaters and are always a success.