Mrs. Warren's ProfessionMiddle-aged Mrs. Warren is a madam, proprietress of a string of successful brothels. Her daughter, Vivie, is a modern young woman, but not so modern that she's not shocked to discover the source of her mother's wealth. The clash of these two strong-willed but culturally constrained Victorian women is the spark that ignites the ironic wit of one of George Bernard Shaw's greatest plays, a withering critique of male domination, sexual hypocrisy, and societal convention. Initially banned after its 1893 publication with its startling frankness, Mrs. Warren's Profession remains a powerful work of progressive theater. Irish playwright GEORGE BERNARD SHAW (1856-1950) won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1925 and an Academy Award for Adapted Screenplay in 1938, the only person to achieve both honors. Among his many renowned plays are Arms and the Man (1894), Candida (1894), Man and Superman (1903), Major Barbara (1905), and Pygmalion (1913). |
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Page 10
... beauty in your life ? VIVIE . I don't care for either , I assure you . PRAED . You can't mean that . \TVIE . Oh , yes , I do . I like working and getting paid for it . When I'm tired of working , I like a comfortable chair , a cigar , a ...
... beauty in your life ? VIVIE . I don't care for either , I assure you . PRAED . You can't mean that . \TVIE . Oh , yes , I do . I like working and getting paid for it . When I'm tired of working , I like a comfortable chair , a cigar , a ...
Page 14
... beauty would become a torment to her if she could not escape from it occasionally . You are probably on much more confidential terms with Kitty than I am . Surely you can ask her the question yoursetf . CROFTS . ( Rising impatiently ...
... beauty would become a torment to her if she could not escape from it occasionally . You are probably on much more confidential terms with Kitty than I am . Surely you can ask her the question yoursetf . CROFTS . ( Rising impatiently ...
Page 20
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Page 47
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afraid beauty believe better go box hedge Brussels Budapest chair Chancery Lane chatelaine chivalry clergyman COSIMO cottage door cottage garden course daughter dear Miss Warren dear Praddy dear Viv dearie face father feel fool FRANK Frank Gardner friends gate gentleman girl wants goes gone Good-bye Goodnight gov'nor Hallo hammock Haslemere hear inner room jolly keep Kitty little boy little girl live looking marry mathematical tripos mean mind Miss Vivie mother never Newnham nonsense opens porch PRAED Praed's pray rectory garden respect rifle Rising sentimental settle shake hands Sir George Crofts sits sort speak stand stare stay stick stops sundial suppose sure talk tell thank there's thing told turns Verona Vienna Vivie comes Vivie's voice wait walking Warren and Vivie waster what's window woman writing table young lady
Popular passages
Page 23 - He either fears his fate too much, Or his deserts are small, That dares not put it to the touch, To gain or lose it all.
Page 42 - Why the devil shouldnt I invest my money that way ? I take the interest on my capital like other people: I hope you dont think I dirty my own hands with the work. Come! you wouldnt refuse the acquaintance of my mother's cousin the Duke of Belgravia because some of the rents he gets are earned in queer ways. You wouldnt cut the Archbishop of Canterbury, I suppose, because the Ecclesiastical Commissioners have a few publicans and sinners among their tenants. Do you remember your Crofts scholarship...
Page 56 - I always wanted to be a good woman. I tried honest work; and I was slave-driven until I cursed the day I ever heard of honest work. I was a good mother; and because I made my daughter a good woman she turns me out as if I was a leper.
Page 30 - People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can't find them, make them.
Page 31 - ... waitress; and then I went to the bar at Waterloo station: fourteen hours a day serving drinks and washing glasses for four shillings a week and my board. That was considered a great promotion for me. Well, one cold, wretched night, when I was so tired I could hardly keep myself awake, who should come up for a half of Scotch but Lizzie, in a long fur cloak, elegant and comfortable, with a lot of sovereigns in her purse.
Page 56 - ... with it. If I had been you, mother, I might have done as you did; but I should not have lived one life and believed in another. You are a conventional woman at heart. That is why I am bidding you goodbye now. I am right, am I not? MRS. WARREN (taken aback). Right to throw away all my money! VIVIE. No: right to get rid of you? I should be a fool not to ? Isn't that so ? MRS.
Page 30 - They were the respectable ones. Well, what did they get by their respectability? I'll tell you. One of them worked in a whitelead factory twelve hours a day for nine shillings a week until she died of lead poisoning. She only expected to get her hands a little paralyzed; but she died.
Page 11 - ... holiday, as my mother imagines. I hate holidays. PRAED You make my blood run cold. Are you to have no romance, no beauty in your life? VIVIE I dont care for either, I assure you. PRAED You cant mean that.
Page 31 - What are you doing there, you little fool ? wearing out your health and your appearance for other people's profit!' Liz was saving money then to take a house for herself in Brussels; and she thought we two could save faster than one. So she lent me some money and gave me a start; and I saved steadily and first paid her back, and then went into business with her as her partner. Why...
Page 31 - Why shouldnt I have done it? The house in Brussels was real high class: a much better place for a woman to be in than the factory where Anne Jane got poisoned. None of our girls were ever treated as I was treated in the scullery of that temperance place, or at the Waterloo bar, or at home.