Dec 23, 2009

Major Barbara | Overview of Major Barbara

Calling Major Barbara Shaw's "most successful" drama, Kennedy provides an overview and background of Shaw's play in this essay.

Shaw wrote a number of plays concerned with wealth and its distribution, but Major Barbara may be the most complex in theme and the most successful as drama. Barbara Undershaft has defied upper-class conventions by becoming a major in the Salvation Army, dedicating herself to the poor of London, who, naturally enough, resist her ministrations whenever they go beyond food and shelter. Adolphus Cusins, a professor of Greek given to quoting Euripides, pretends an equal dedication in order to be near her. Her mother, Lady Britomart— the owner of one of Shaw's most resounding...