In 1900 Bernard Shaw completed the difficult task of drafting the Fabian's society position in the manifest Fabianism and the Empire. The society's progressive program advocated for socialist values, social justice and women rights. Against the background of these modern and leftist values though, the society's position on imperialism is somehow astonishing. One of the motives for its supportive stand on imperialism lies in the yet valid division...

The world of George Bernard Shaw -- Introduction / by John A. Bertolini -- Preface to Mrs. Warren's profession : mainly about myself -- Mrs. Warren's profession -- Preface to Candida : plays pleasant -- Candida -- Preface to The devil's disciple : three plays for Puritans -- The devil's disciple -- Shaw's notes to The devil's disciple -- Epistle dedicatory to Man and superman -- Man and superman -- Excerpts from The revolutionist's handbook and pocket...

"Following her successful appearance at an Embassy Ball--where Eliza Doolittle won Professor Henry Higgins' bet that he could pass off a Cockney flower girl as a duchess--Eliza becomes an assistant to his chief rival Emil Nepommuck. After Nepommuck publicly takes credit for transforming Eliza into a lady, an enraged Higgins submits proof to a London newspaper that Nepommuck is a fraud. When Nepommuck is found with a dagger in his back, Henry Higgins...

"Disgusted and bored by the trend for titillation and sham on the London stage, Shaw wrote these plays both to educate and entertain his audiences. In The Devil's Disciple, a clergyman turned soldier and the Shavian ideal of a Puritan hero - 'like all genuinely religious men, a reprobate and an outcast' - willingly risks his life for a stranger. Caesar and Cleopatra, a brilliant satire on contemporary Britain, contains an utterly unexpected portrait...

"Epifania is glamorous, clever-- and also the richest woman in the world. After yet another row with her spendthrift husband, Epifania meets an intriguing Egyptian doctor. But she faces the challenge her money-mad father imposed on her before his death: She can only marry a man who can convert 150 pounds into 50,000 pounds within six months"--Container. In the bonus play, set 40 years in the future, the king must match wits with an unruly mistress...

Arrogant, irascible, and misogynistic professor of phonetics Henry Higgins believes that the accent and tone of one's voice determines a person's prospects in society. He boasts to a new acquaintance, Colonel Hugh Pickering -- also an expert in phonetics -- that he could teach any woman to speak so "properly" that he could pass her off as a duchess at an embassy ball. He chooses as an example a sassy, young working-class London flower seller from...