Shaw's Unwomanly Heroines

Shaw's Unwomanly Heroines

Although My Fair Lady may not be popular among Shavians, it once had a great influence on a certain Japanese girl. While engrossed in musicals during her teens, Mariko Oe saw My Fair Lady and was totally enchanted by it. She memorized almost all the lines and began to read everything about the musical, until finally she took up Pygmalion and then other plays by Shaw. Years went by, and the teenager grew into a spirited Shavian scholar and the author of My Fair Ladies: Untamed Heroines in the Plays of Bernard Shaw, a book based on her doctoral dissertation (Kobe College, 2001) entitled "Shaw's Heroines Who Change Traditional Theatrical Forms." Oe has chosen five heroines from Bernard Shaw's plays: Vivie Warren, Barbara Undershaft, Eliza Doolittle, Ellie Dunn, and Joan of Arc. These are some of Shaw's unwomanly heroines or "New Women": trying to free themselves from conventional restrictions and be true to their own values, often rejecting a way of life generally regarded as "natural" for women. On the other hand, Shaw made use of the popular forms of the nineteenth-century theater in his plays. Oe's book draws our attention to the relationship between Shaw's views on women and the dramatic forms he adopted and attempts to show that his characterizations of heroines allowed him to reform the dramatic conventions of his day. What strikes one most is Oe's vivid description of the heroines and her clear-cut analysis of the plays and their structure. Above all, we can see that the author loves plays, especially Shaw's plays.

The prologue, "Traditional Theatrical Forms and Shaw's View on Women," examines nineteenth-century theater and the reforms brought about by Henrik Ibsen. Referring to the sensation caused by Ibsen's plays, Oe introduces the notion of the "Unwomanly Woman" that Shaw advocates in The Quintessence of Ibsenism. To illustrate how Shaw formed his views on women, Oe discusses some of the independent women in Shaw's life: his mother Lucinda, his wife Charlotte, Beatrice Webb, and Mrs. Patrick Campbell. Oe suggests that these women inspired Shaw to create a new type of heroine: one who questions the traditional meaning of marriage, makes a living for herself, and, most importantly, remains true to her own values and goals.

Chapter 1, "Mrs Warren's Profession—Well-Made Play and a 'New Woman,'" demonstrates how Mrs Warren's Profession follows the pattern of the so-called well-made play, albeit with the traditional denouement replaced by a debate between Mrs. Warren, the "woman with a past," and Vivie, her Cambridge-educated daughter. Unlike other popular plays featuring a "fallen woman"—such as Arthur Wing Pinero's The Second Mrs. Tanqueray (1893), in which Paula Tanqueray commits suicide—neither mother nor daughter kills herself at the end of Shaw's play. Instead, the blame lies with a social system that forces women into prostitution to support themselves. Oe argues that Shaw's innovative ending was made possible through the characterization of these two independent-minded women. Both mother and daughter pursue careers, never dreaming of marriage or a more traditional lifestyle. Yet they have opposite dispositions: while Vivie is depicted as a "New Woman" seeking a masculine-style life, Mrs. Warren is an old-fashioned career woman whose profession makes use of her femininity. Oe finds an interesting reason for their parting of ways: although both are "unwomanly," each wants the other to lead a "womanly" life, a powerful if predictable argument.

"Major Barbara—Melodrama and a Major of the Salvation Army," Oe's second chapter, defines the play as a melodrama but with a significant alteration in the expected plot form at the end, as in Mrs Warren's Profession. Oe explains that Major Barbara is...