Major Barbara (New Mermaids) - Softcover

Shaw, Bernard

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0713679956 ISBN 13: 9780713679953

Publisher: Methuen Drama, 2008

Synopsis

"There are two things necessary to salvation ... money and gunpowder"

Major Barbara, Bernard Shaw's story of the conversion contest between the arms manufacturer Andrew Undershaft and his daughter, the Salvation Army Major, is a provocative dramatization of the relationship between money, power, and moral purpose. A landmark in the history of British theatre when first produced at the Royal Court in 1905, it remains strikingly relevant today, when recent history has repeatedly highlighted the power of the arms industry in shaping government policy, and globalization has accentuated the political and ethical issues of social welfare and international capital raised by the play.

This edition includes Shaw's definitive text and provides the most comprehensive scholarly treatment of the play to date. A lengthy Introduction traces the history of the text from manuscript drafts to the famous 1941 wartime film version starring Wendy Hiller and Rex Harrison and on to modern stagings. It reveals Major Barbara as one of Shaw's most exciting and challenging plays for actors, directors, and readers.

About this title

From the Back Cover

'The greatest of our evils and the worst of our crimes is poverty ... our first duty, to which every other consideration should be sacrificed, is not to be poor'

Andrew Undershaft, a millionaire armaments dealer, loves money and despises poverty. His energetic daughter Barbara, on the other hand, shows her love for the poor by working as a Major in the Salvation Army. She sees her father as just another soul to be saved. But when the Salvation Army needs funds to keep going, it is Undershaft who saves the day. Is the Army right to accept money that has been obtained by 'Death and Destruction'? Barbara is forced to question her philanthropic motives, and what she discovers tells her something new about the world and its ways.

Full of lively comedy and sparkling debate, Major Barbara is also one of Shaw's most powerful and forward-looking plays. As Margery Morgan says, while Shaw was responding to 'a material and cultural situation that is now part of history', his work still has relevance 'in a period when new technologies drive the globalization of trade and the migration of populations ... and ancient forms of brutality and carnage have re-appeared.'

The definitive text, under the editorial supervision of Dan H. Laurence

From the Inside Flap

Barbara is a major in the Salvation Army - but she's also the daughter of Andrew Undershaft, a man who's made millions from the sale of weapons of war. The real battle, however, rages between between the devilish father and his idealistic daughter as they answer the question: does salvation come through faith or finance? This sparkling comedy traverses family relations, religion, ethics and politics - as only Shaw, the master dramatist, can!

An L.A. Theatre Works full-cast performance featuring:

JB Blanc as Bill Walker/Dialect Coach

Kate Burton as Lady Britomart

Matthew Gaydos as Snobby Price/Bilton

Brian George as Morrison/Peter Shirley

Hamish Linklater as Stephen Undershaft

Henri Lubatti as Adolphus Cusins

Tony Palermo as Sound Effects Artist

Kirsten Potter as Barbara Undershaft

Roger Rees as Andrew Undershaft

Russell Soder as Charles Lomax

Amelia White as Rummy Mitchens/Mrs. Baines

Missy Yager as Sarah Undershaft

Sarah Zimmerman as Jenny Hill

Directed by Dakin Matthews. Recorded before a live audience at the Skirball Cultural Center, Los Angeles in December, 2007.

About this edition

• Publisher: Methuen Drama
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0713679956
• ISBN 13: 9780713679953
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 208
• Editor: Grene Nicholas