Bernard Shaw’s concern for the perfection of the English language in his Comedy “Pygmalion” content introduction chapter I. George Bernard Shaw's life and work

1.2. Plays reflecting historical events
Shaw published a collected edition of his plays in 1934, comprising forty-two works.216 He wrote a further twelve in the remaining sixteen years of his life, mostly one-act pieces. Including eight earlier plays that he chose to omit from his published works, the total is sixty-two.n 25

Early worksedit

1890s
Full-length plays

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  Widowers' Houses
  
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  The Philanderer
  
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  Mrs Warren's Profession
  
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  Arms and the Man
  
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  Candida
  
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  You Never Can Tell
  
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  The Devil's Disciple
  
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  Caesar and Cleopatra
  
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  Captain Brassbound's Conversion
  

Adaptation

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  The Gadfly
  

Short play

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  The Man of Destiny
  

Shaw's first three full-length plays dealt with social issues. He later grouped them as "Plays Unpleasant".217 Widower's Houses (1892) concerns the landlords of slum properties, and introduces the first of Shaw's New Women—a recurring feature of later plays.218 The Philanderer (1893) develops the theme of the New Woman, draws on Ibsen, and has elements of Shaw's personal relationships, the character of Julia being based on Jenny Patterson.219 In a 2003 study Judith Evans describes Mrs Warren's Profession (1893) as "undoubtedly the most challenging" of the three Plays Unpleasant, taking Mrs Warren's profession—prostitute and, later, brothel-owner—as a metaphor for a prostituted society.220
Shaw followed the first trilogy with a second, published as "Plays Pleasant".217 Arms and the Man (1894) conceals beneath a mock-Ruritanian comic romance a Fabian parable contrasting impractical idealism with pragmatic socialism.221 The central theme of Candida (1894) is a woman's choice between two men; the play contrasts the outlook and aspirations of a Christian Socialist and a poetic idealist.222 The third of the Pleasant group, You Never Can Tell (1896), portrays social mobility, and the gap between generations, particularly in how they approach social relations in general and mating in particular.223
The "Three Plays for Puritans"—comprising The Devil's Disciple (1896), Caesar and Cleopatra (1898) and Captain Brassbound's Conversion (1899)—all centre on questions of empire and imperialism, a major topic of political discourse in the 1890s.224 The three are set, respectively, in 1770s America, Ancient Egypt, and 1890s Morocco.225 The Gadfly, an adaptation of the popular novel by Ethel Voynich, was unfinished and unperformed.226 The Man of Destiny (1895) is a short curtain raiser about Napoleon.227

1900–1909edit