The Cambridge Companion to George Bernard Shaw ed. by Christopher Innes

Abstract

ESC 26, 2000 prose, studded with jargon, obscurities (“hypercathectic”), and neologisms (“actants,” “facticity”), only to see the author ar­ rive at conclusions ranging from the disappointingly trite to the stunningly obvious. Neither the opacity of the language, nor the invocation of scores of scholarly authorities, can wholly camouflage these shortcomings. Documenting the prevalence in the ILN of bourgeois moralizing, chauvinism, racism, xenopho­ bia, and “a fundamental imperative [... ] to sell newspapers in an increasingly competitive, early Victorian market” (204) will strike most readers as small reward for the theoretical exertions by which the author, much like a taxidermist, has stretched and mounted the pelt of the IL N . There are elements of a worth­ while study here, albeit struggling unsuccessfully to escape from a suffocating overburden of once-trendy critical theory, stilted jargon, and tortured prose. As the author himself concludes, much scholarly work still remains to be done on the Illustrated London News. MERRILL DISTAD / University of Alberta Christopher Innes, ed. The Cambridge Companion to George Bernard Shaw. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. xxxii, 343. Illustrations. $28.05 paper. The Cambridge Companion to George Bernard Shaw is a wel­ come addition to an already prestigious series. Its scope is pri­ marily restricted to Shaw’s theatre with pertinent references to his wider output wherever relevant. The contributors are out­ standing Shavian scholars from England, Scotland, the United States, and Canada. With so much learning presented, the read­ ing is highly informative and the arguments convincingly axrayed , and never dull. Readers may find the book delightful, as several authors seem to reflect the subject’s own brilliant and skipping versatility. Part 1, “The social and cultural context,” consists of Sally Peters’s writing on Shaw’s feminism, obsession with health, and views on marriage. This is followed by Katherine E. Kelly on his dealings with publishers: “In taking play publication seri­ ously, Shaw proved a shrewd forecaster of a growing interest 510 REVIEWS in drama as a literary genre” (50). Charles A. Berst writes on Shaw’s “crusade for a New Drama to transcend [... ] trivial­ ities” (68) carried on in his theatre criticism and defense of Ibsen. Kerry Powell contributes a thorough analysis of Shaw’s “New Women.” Part 2, “Shaw the dramatist,” starts with Frederick J. Mark­ er’s penetrating study of the early plays. A delightful chapter by David J. Gordon examines the differences between Shaw and Wilde in spite of their apparent affinities: “Wildean and Sha­ vian comedy both seem to be initiated by satire but before long they slide into something else” (131). “Structure and philoso­ phy in Man and Superman and Major B a r b a r a a challenging chapter by Fredric Berg, follows. As parables of human develop­ ment these plays convey Shaw’s theories of the Life Force and human evolution tightly sealed in “triangular structures” into which the debates are cast. Although the roles of the disputants are already present in the earliest plays, Man and Superman is the first play where the character (Superman) and the philoso­ phy (Life Force) “first clearly converged.” It is “the first great play of the twentieth century” (145). Christopher Innes discusses Shaw’s unique dramatic form, the Discussion Play, or, as he called it, the “play of ideas,” used to attack various social abuses. Ronald Bryden sheds new light on Shaw’s difficulties in composing Heartbreak House, originally projected as a comedy in Aristophanic style. It anticipates The Simpleton of the Unexpected Isles. Matthew H. Wikander treats the reader to a witty exposition of Shaw’s “reinvention of the history play” (197) in Caesar and Cleopatra, Saint Joan, and In Good King Charles’s Golden Days. Tracy C. Davis writes a thorough study of the parallels between imperialistic and mari­ tal exploitation in six plays ranging from Candida to The Sim­ pleton. Her discussion of the latter play is exceptionally astute. A chapter on “The later Shaw” deals with the plays from 1928 to 1947, generally deemed to be lesser works but redeemed by T. F. Evans’s perceptive analyses that emphasize Shaw’s origi­ nality and “ability to move with the times” (252). Part 3, “Theatre work and influence,” brings the volume to...