Shaw’s Sense of History by J. L. Wisenthal (review)

HUMANITIES 131 tions of Williams's particularist approach make themselves felt. At the same time, however, her study usefully reminds us that literary fictions present a special problematic that cannot, despite some current critical trends, be dissolved entirely into the historical processes in which they are entangled. (INA FERRIS) J.L. Wisenthal. Shaw's Sense of History Oxford University Press. viii, 186. $56.50 J.L. Wisenthal, who has elsewhere examined the so-called 'marriage of contraries' in some of Shaw's central plays, here focuses his attention on apparent contradictions in the Shavian view of history. While acknowledging his debt to critics such as Julian B. Kaye and Martin Meisel who have explored Shaw's work in the nineteenth-century context, Wisenthal closely examines the importance of the historiography of the period to Shaw's ideas and their dramatic expression. The lengthy introductory chapter (nearly a third of the book) centres on Carlyle and Macaulay. In an age fascinated by history, 'Carlyle and Macaulay wrote about the past with the Victorian present very much in mind.' Macaulay expounded the popular view of history as an ascent to the marvels of the Victorian age, while Carlyle insisted on a decline into contemporary godlessness and decadence. The influence of other thinkers is taken into account as well: prominent figures such as Marx, Hegel, and Nietzsche are examined alongside such lesser-known Victorians as J.S. Stuart-Glennie and Henry Thomas Buckle. After this extensive coverage of the historiographical material, WisenthaI provides detailed analysis of the presence of 'history' in Shaw's plays. The most provocative aspect of this analysis is its expansion of the limits of the 'history play' in Shaw's work. Wisenthal demonstrates that beyond the plays such as Saint Joan, 'In Good King Charles's Golden Days,' and Caesar and Cleopatra, which are clearly historical in subject, many others rely for meaning on articulating a relation between past and present and an opposition of ideas of decline and progress. Of Major Barbara Wisenthal writes, 'I consider it to be one of Shaw's main history plays' and in a later chapter entitled 'Present History' he convincingly details Shaw's treatment of the present 'as a historical period' in such plays as John Bull's Other Island, Major Barbara, and Heartbreak House. With the historical background so clearly in mind, seemingly small details such as person and place names, or apparently casual references to historical events or persons, take on unexpected importance. The description of Perivale St Andrews in Major Barbara, for instance, is seen as an ironic echo ofMacaulay's famous description of Torbay in his History ofEngland, as is Broadbent's plan for Rosscullen in John Bull's Other Island. 132 LETTERS IN CANADA 1988 But the added emphasis upon historical detail is not the central point. In the play between present and past (and sometimes future, as in Back to Methuselah), and between ideas of progress and decline, Wisenthal elaborates a theory of Shaw's use of a 'double-perspective' in his plays. This manipulation of perspective is clear, for instance, in a play such as Saint Joan: Ifwe look at Joan from the point ofview of the declining Middle Ages, then she appears as a necessary and progressive force in history. This is the main perspective within Saint Joan, but the play is written for a twentieth-century audience, and from our point of view Joan represents the forces that are now the established ones in our society. This interpretation has the advantage of making structural sense of the epilogue to that play. In the final chapter, 'Shavian History and Shavian Drama,' Wisenthal makes a number of tantalizing suggestions that do not receive extended examination. He remarks, for instance, that 'there are many explanations for Shaw's switch from novelist to dramatist, and some of them are related to his attitudes towards history.' This chapter also shows the mark of contemporary historical theory, particularly that of Hayden White. FollowingWhite's notion of 'emplotment' in historical writing, Wisenthal analyses the 'encounter between genres' in Shaw's work to suggest that the 'tragic' and 'comic' view are both contained in such plays as Saint Joan and Major...