The last two decades of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century witnessed a remarkable resurgence of the drama throughout the continent and in England too. Ibsen in Norway, Checkov in Russia, Strindberg in Sweden, Pirandello in Italy and Eugene O’Neill in the United States brought a new spirit and a new life to the almost moribund theatre of the 19th century.
The 20th century play-writing has been strongly individualistic, making it difficult to identify trends or schools.
Contemporary English drama has been particularly strong in realism or at least the guise of realism. Yet the greatest modern British dramatist, G.B.Shaw, is first of all a master of drama of ideas. He proposed to re-establish the drama. Rejecting melodrama, romanticism conventional stage romance, he “tried slum-landlordism, doctrinaire free-love (pseudo-Ibsenism), prostitution, militarism, marriage, history, current politics, natural Christianity, national and individual character, paradoxes of conventional society, husband-hunting, questions of conscience, professional delusion and imposture, all worked into a series of comedies of manners in the classic fashion”.
Shaw’s dramatic technique is particularly his own. He carried out a genuine revolution in the theatre by abandoning the 19th century emphasis on plot and turning to the drama of discussion or talking play.
A typical nineteenth-century drama consisted of an exposition, a complication and a denouement. Shaw retained the first two of these elements but abandoned the denouement in favor of discussion.
In the 1890’s Shaw published his three now famous cycles of plays. In 1892-1893 his “Play Unpleasant” made their appearance including “Widowers’ House”, “Mrs. Warren’s Profession”, “The Philanderer”.
He explains why he has labeled the three plays unpleasant: “the dramatic power is used to force the spectator to face unpleasant facts.”
The next cycle of Shaw’s plays, called “Plays Pleasant”, appeared during the period of 1894-1897 (including “Arms and the Man”, “The Man of Destiny”, “Candida”, “You Never Can Tell”). These plays deal less with the crime of society, and more with its romantic follies (prostie, absurditate) and with the struggles of individuals against those follies.
The third cycle, that of “Three Plays for Puritans” was written by Shaw in 1897-1899; it includes “The Devil’s Disciple”, “Caesar and Cleopatra”, “Captain Brassbound’s Conversion”. The first two plays, formally based on historical facts, assail bourgeois morality, and debunk the old romantic myths of love, gallantry and heroism.
He continued to write vigorously for another five decades. Among these plays we may mention here “Man and Superman”, “Pygmalion”, “Saint Joan”, “The Apple Cart”, “On the Rocks”.
“The Devil’s Disciple” is particularly interesting and among his chief plays. It is a satirical melodrama with philosophical overtones, laid in the time of the American Revolution. The chief theme is the hypocrisy of Puritan society.
The avalanche of war is sweeping close to the little provincial town of Westerbridge. Timothy and Peter Dudgeon, brothers but opposite in character, have both died as the action opens. Peter, a profligate and black sheep, has been hanged by the British as a hostage and Timothy, a respectable citizen, has died after disinheriting his wife and leaving his possessions to his son Richard, who resembles Peter in character.
Richard Dudgeon is known to be an outspoken enemy of the puritan community. He mocks at his relatives and fellow-citizens calling them bigots and “honest profiteers”. To defy the community, Richard proclaims himself to be “The Devil’s Disciple”. The family is scandalized when Richard comes to the house for the reading of the will and speaks arrogantly to everyone present, including the local minister, Mr. Anderson. Only Essie, the ill-treated illegitimate daughter of Peter Dudgeon, respects Richard and sees a kind soul in the friendless behavior.
In the second act, set in Minister Anderson’s house, the minister sends for Richard to warn him. The British are likely to arrest and hang as they did to his uncle. During the interview, Anderson is called away and British soldiers shortly enter to arrest him. Richard pretends he is Anderson and allows himself to be taken away in the minister’s place, first forcing Anderson’s pretty wife, to take part in the farce and kiss him good-bye. Judith is indignant but after Richard leaves she realizes the sacrifice she has made for her husband. When Anderson returns and discovers Richard’s act of heroism, he gallops off madly to some mysterious destination. Judith imagines he is fleeing from the British, and her disgust is transferred to her husband while her love to the condemned Richard. But just as Richard’s execution is about to take place, Anderson who has taken command of an irregular colonial troop arrives as an emissary with a British safe-conduct in his hand.
The Americans have captured a nearby town and now menace the British position; Richard is saved. Anderson’s unexpected arrival makes his wife both glad and ashamed. Before this she thought her husband had fled leaving Richard to the mercy of the English soldiers.
Both Richard and Anderson are paradoxical characters evolving contrary to our expectations. The priest Anderson runs away and becomes a fighter instead of mildly accepting martyrdom, the sinner Richard Dudgeon instead of confessing his love, confesses his indifference and accepts self-sacrifice to save another man’s life and help a noble cause, and finally the British. General Burgoyne is an antimilitarist, a gentleman and a man of humor.
Moreover the play is important in so much as it sets off some of Shaw’s serious ideas:
-the right of people to be free, to choose the government they think best and any colonial domination is therefore hateful;
-the absurdity of war and especially of the custom of idealizing it (clearly expressed in the stage directions):
-the harmful effects of dead Puritanism which thwarts and distorts human feelings (obvious in the presentation of Mrs. Dudgeon’s home : “She believes that a lose is a sort of heart disease”;
-great herald actions do not come from any common place motive; they are born in the soul, in naked beauty, they are necessity of one’s nature and along this line, Richard is true to his nature.

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