SHAW: The Annual of Bernard Shaw Studies, Vol. 16
Unpublished Shaw
Edited by Dan H. Laurence, and Edited by Margot Peters
SHAW: The Annual of Bernard Shaw Studies, Vol. 16
Unpublished Shaw
Edited by Dan H. Laurence, and Edited by Margot Peters
SHAW 16 contains twenty-nine unpublished pieces by Shaw written between 1877 and 1950. The most significant is a ten-page draft synopsis of Man and Superman (the original manuscript draft of the play has been lost) in a contemplated five-act version, providing scholars with a hitherto unavailable ur-text. Equally important for the biographical and artistic insights they offer are the early literary efforts found in Shaw's first opus notebook, including an extended narrative-verse fragment of 1877 set in Dublin; a polemic (his first) on oakum picking and prison conditions; a criticism of organists and orchestral conductors; and an attempted evaluation of contemporary arts and letters in 1878.
- Description
- Table of Contents
- Subjects
We find Shaw, through the persona of a female narrator, creating in his own image a fictional memoir of the young Hector Berlioz; offering an ironic vindication of housebreakers (in anticipation of Heartbreak House); exploring the seamy side of the prizefight ring; examining "exhausted" genres of Victorian art in 1880; defining the "true signification of the term Gentleman"; lecturing on Socialism and the family and on realism as the goal of fiction; and penetratingly considering the future of marriage in a rejected book review, one of four included in the volume.
The dimensions of Shaw's political views may be examined through nearly a dozen commentaries on politics and on war and peace, ranging from the Boer War (an 1899 draft letter to the press, "Why Not Abolish the Soldier?") and 1903 municipal elections to U.S. Liberty Loans, the Italo-Abyssinian War, "how to talk intelligently" about the Second World War, and the implications of the hydrogen bomb in the nuclear age. For good measure, the volume concludes with two brief playlets, previously unrecorded.
The editors have arranged these pieces individually or grouped by theme and genre as near to chronological order as possible, and the reader is brought closer to the original manuscripts by the retention of Shaw's stylistic and spelling inconsistencies, and by transliteration of the shorthand notations he frequently inserted between lines or in the margins. Each text is supplemented by an editorial note providing its provenance and a detailed physical description of the manuscript.
Contents
NOTICES xi
GENERAL INTRODUCTION 1
Dan H. Laurence and Margot Peters
SHAW AS POETASTER: IN FYTTES AND STARTS 7
Richard Nickson, introducing:
[NARRATIVE VERSE, fragment (1877)] 9
APPROACHING THE CHALLENGE 17
Dan H. Laurence, introducing:
CONTEMPORARY ART VIEWED FROM BEHIND THE AGE (1878) 18
OAKUM PICKING (1878) 25
ASIDES (1889) 28
MUSIC: LAYING DOWN THE LAW 35
J. L. Wisenthal, introducing:
CONDUCTORS AND ORGANISTS (1879) 38
UNCONSCIONABLE ABUSES (1879) 44
SHAW'S TRUE GENTLEMAN 59
Margot Peters, introducing:
ON THE TRUE SIGNIFICATION OF THE TERM
GENTLEMAN (1879) 63
BERLIOZ AND SHAW: AN AFFINITY 67
Jacques Barzun, introducing:
A REMINISCENCE OF HECTOR BERLIOZ (1880) 71
A SPRING-CLEANING FOR THE ARTS 89
Norma Jenckes, introducing:
EXHAUSTED ARTS (1880) 93
ENTER THE LITERARY CRITIC 99
Brian Tyson, introducing:
[REVIEW OF H.B. PRITCHARD'S GEORGE VANBRUGH'S
MISTAKE, fragment (1880)] 99
[THE FUTURE OF MARRIAGE (1885)] 101
A SOCIALIST'S NOTION OF A NOVEL (1887) 104
FOUND AT LAST—A NEW POET (1887) 108
THAT REALISM IS THE GOAL OF FICTION (lecture, 1888) 111
ON POLITICS 125
Stuart E. Baker, introducing:
OPEN AIR MEETINGS (1885) 129
PROUDHON—CH IV. PROPOSITIONS I-V PP 126- 153 (1886) 133
TEN REASONS WHY WOMEN SHOULD SUPPORT THE
PROGRESSIVES AT THE BOROUGH COUNCIL
ELECTIONS (1903) 137
[LADY DAY SPEECH (1929)] 139
SHAW FAMILY VALUES 145
John A. Bertolini, introducing:
SOCIALISM AND THE FAMILY (1886) 148
SHAW AND THE SEAMY SIDE OF THE RING 155
Sally Peters, introducing:
A PRIZEFIGHTER ON PRIZEFIGHTING: THE SEAMY SIDE OF THE RING (1888) 157
ON WAR AND PEACE 165
Alfred Turco, Jr., introducing:
WHY NOT ABOLISH THE SOLDIER? (1899) 167
[APPEAL FOR THE SECOND U.S. LIBERTY LOAN (1917)] 172
[REPLIES TO QUESTIONNAIRE (1920)] 175
[MESSAGE TO THE WORLD LEAGUE FOR PEACE (1928;
facsimile issued 1932)] 177
[SELF-DRAFTED INTERVIEW AT DURBAN (1935)] 178
HOW TO TALK INTELLIGENTLY ABOUT THE WAR (1940) 181
BERNARD SHAW ON PEACE (1950) 185
SUPERMAN THEATER: GUSTS, GALUMPHS,
AND GRUMPS 195
Charles A. Berst, introducing:
THE SUPERMAN, OR DON JUAN'S GREAT GRANDSON'S
GRANDSON (1901) 202
THE MAN WHO STANDS NO NONSENSE: A DRAMA (1904) 211
THE TRINITY V JACKSON (1912) 216
REVIEWS
GUIDED TOUR THROUGH HEARTBREAK HOUSE
(Heartbreak House: Preludes of Apocalypse by A. M. Gibbs) 223
John A. Bertolini
BENN LEVY AND SHAW (The Plays of Benn Levy:
Between Shaw and Coward by Susan Rusinko) 226
Stanley Weintraub
BERNARD SHAW: SOCIALIST AND DRAMATIST
(George Bernard Shaw and the Socialist Theatre by
Tracy C. Davis) 229
Frederick P. W. McDowell
A CONTINUING CHECKLIST OF SHAVIANA 233
John R. Pfeiffer
CONTRIBUTORS 247
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