Arms and the Man

George Bernard Shaw was born in Dublin in 1856. His father was a failed grain merchant and a drunkard; his mother a professional singer who left her husband and moved to London when Shaw was fifteen. He remained in Dublin with his father, completing his schooling, which he hated, and working as a clerk for an estate office. In 1876 he went to London, joining his sister and mother, and did not return to Ireland for nearly thirty years.  He began his literary career by writing music and drama criticism, and novels, without much success. In 1884 he joined the Fabian Society, serving on its executive committee from 1885 to 1911.

A man of many causes, Shaw supported abolition of private property, radical change in the voting system, was a defender of women’s rights, and campaigned for the simplification of spelling and the reform of the English alphabet.  In 1891, Shaw wrote his first play, Widower's Houses. For the next twelve years, he wrote close to a dozen plays, though he generally failed to persuade the managers of the London Theatres to produce them. A few were produced abroad, and several were presented in single performances by private societies.  In 1904, Harley Granville Barker took over the management of the Court Theatre on Sloane Square. Over the next three seasons, Barker produced ten plays by Shaw (with Barker officially listed as director, and with Shaw actually directing his own plays).

For the next ten years, all but one of Shaw's plays (Pygmalion in 1914) was produced either by Barker or by Barker's friends and colleagues. In 1925 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. Shaw accepted the honor but refused the money.  In 1898 Shaw married Charlotte Payne-Townshend, and he remained with her until her death, although he was occasionally linked with other women, notably the actress Mrs. Patrick Campbell. He wrote over 50 plays, continuing to write into his 90s. He died at Ayot St. Lawrence, Hertfordshire, on November 2, 1950, from complications following a fall from a ladder.