Sociology of Drama. Mrs. Warren’s Profession and The Good Woman of Setzuan Dissertation

Summary

This section focuses on the review of the literature with regard to the two plays under critical evaluation: Mrs. Warren’s Profession by George Bernard Shaw; and The Good Woman of Setzuan by Bertold Brecht. The theoretical framework that is set to critically examine these two plays takes a number of perspectives in arriving at a sound critical judgment of these plays. The basic investigation that is undertaken in the literature review of these two plays is to pinpoint their relevance to society and their impact on the ways in which society came to experience a voice for change. This one point is complex and offers a number of angles to view the entire situation not only in the context in which both these plays were written but also in today’s context with these plays standing as historical texts.

Thus the present investigation brings a number of relevant interpretations of these two plays and critically evaluates their validity by cross-examination with other critics and the themes presented in the plays. As such, a number of sources have been utilized to achieve this goal. The works chosen for investigation are from a diverse spectrum of the same plays so that a three-dimensional picture of the plays can be captured. Equally important is the investigation of the backgrounds of these plays which has been duly made in this paper. This is done keeping the view in mind that unless reference and understanding of context are not made, any attempt to critically evaluate these two plays would be futile. Along the same line, the background of the two playwrights, their dramatic theories, and their circumstances have been duly studied in this investigation. It is highly hoped that the investigation would reflect sound coherence and relevance of all the works painstakingly reviewed and examined. It is also hoped that the present investigation would prove to be significant in the present bulk of existing literature and the reader would benefit from reading this document as well as would enjoy traveling through the journey of exploration.

Comparative Analysis

The Good Woman of Setzuan by Bertold Brecht

Before the play The Good Woman of Setzuan can be critically analyzed, it is important to know who its writer was because it, according to me, is closely linked with our understanding of the play keeping with all its background subjectivity. German dramatist and poet, Bertolt Brecht Friedrich (1898-1956) was gifted with brilliant wit. He was outspoken about Marxism and carried revolutionary experiments to the stage: this all portrayed Brecht as a controversial force, a personality with an outspoken image in modern-day drama. Brecht’s early plays Baal (1919) and Drums in the Night (1922), caused him instant notoriety because these plays are instances of nihilistic expressionism that caused riots. Later the dramatist was involved in a different kind of experimentation. He introduced a number of different devices in making his so-called epic theater. He brought together his narrative, self-contained scenes, montage, and rational arguments that were focused to shock the spectator through a transition toward realization. A distancing effect is also the creation of Brecht while the play was staged; this was done to achieve a more objective perspective on the action; what is interesting to note is that his actors did not identify themselves with their roles; what they instead do was merely manifest the actions of the characters that they had to portray. Sets and lighting also had a significant role to play in Brecht’s creativity on the stage along with songs for which Brecht himself wrote lyrics. It was in 1933 that Brecht went into exile and it was during this period that he created such plays as Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder [Mother Courage and her children] and Der gute Mensch von Sezuan (tr. The Good Woman of Setzuan). These two plays are considered his most mature works¹.

The Good Woman of Setzuan (1938-40) tells us the story of Shen Te, a young lady who is forced into the profession of prostitution by her state of poverty and is rewarded generously when she opens her house to three gods that visit her. Not approving their argument that no goodness now exists on earth, Shen Te is bestowed with a small business by these gods. She now works honestly to provide for the weak and needy; however, she falls prey to her deceitful neighbors and an unscrupulous lover. Shen Te, however, is forced to create an alter-ego, Mr. Shui Ta, her business-savvy cousin. They both go in contrast to each other: where she is honest and positive, her cousin is manipulative and fierce. And then forces of history and capital ultimately overwhelm Shen Te, who is now forced to yield her goodness or die of hunger:

Since not to eat is to die
Who can long refuse to be bad?
As I lay prostrate beneath the weight of good intentions
Ruin stared me in the face
It was when I was unjust that I ate good meat
— Bertolt Brecht’s The Good Woman of Setzuan.

Though there is serious argument about some major issues related to social being of a human being (or I should say a woman), there is no doubt that the play carries a mix of different creative additions in forms of music, characters, and striking mountainous backdrop (where sometimes balance is difficult to maintain); the incredulous nature of the main character is the essence of the play; moreover, the serious nature of the love affair and the open-endedness leave the spectator poised to come to a logical sense making of the play². This is where the mastery of Brecht is so striking that the play can be called a combination of debate and professional stage play writing.

Keeping all this background information, both about the playwright and the play, it is necessary that Brecht’s theory of dramatization should be explored at length so that the deep lying issues in his dealing with his subjects and social issues can be justifiably appraised. In this regard, it is important to note that review of Brecht’s theses reveal a number of complex issues that he thought addressable and audible. However, the most striking one is that of socialist realism. He seems to define how this method of socialist realism should be employed to work effectively. For instance, he points out that an accurate picture of life is the core essence of this method; through this method the goal of the writer is to influence the people and educate them with socialist spirit, and its conformity to the party. Moreover, he sheds light on how literature and art are related to life and what significance they hold for the socialist realism. In his writings, Brecht has endeavored to awaken his people to socialist realism through his literary efforts so that people could recognize the consciousness of the strength they hold in them. Brecht flaunts his clear message to the spectator that there no inevitability this world that predetermines our fate; what he discerns about life is everything depends on us: how we go about acting in this world; and that there is no power on earth or beyond earth (fate, divine power, or providence) that is uncontrolled by a human being. This is how Brecht’s socialist realism speaks out his conviction in his creative works. If critical appraisal of Brecht’s writing is made, it is found that the writer is out to show his thinking that social reconstruction of life, in a way that is unknown to the world, is possible through socialist realism. New tasks in the world of art can be accomplished by keeping this view in mind. This is where the background of Brecht’s self-image becomes important in analyzing his plays like The Good Woman of Setzuan where we clearly see the mouthpiece of Brecht’s socialist realism at play³.

Backed up with this background theory of the writer, Childs, Tera⁴ When the play The Good Woman of Setzuan was written, it was the time when Social Darwinism was starting to fade away as the one impressive theory of the day in support of classism and sexism. Meanwhile the economic crisis in Europe followed the mayhem of WWI, all strata of society were negatively influenced and so started working hand in hand to arrive at a common solution. The Good Woman of Setzuan clearly reflects this defeat of Social Darwinism by manifesting the insipidity of the theory. The play demonstrates the conviction that the birth-bestowed social status and the inferiority that female sex undergo take a massive struggle in order to detach from this status. This is clearly shown through the ordeals that the protagonist of the play, Shen Ta, faces in the play. Brecht also displays the superiority of the male sex and high birth, in accordance with the theory, portrayed through Shui Ta. The social set up within the boundaries of the play relates to the theory of Social Darwinism; however, the other developing belief represented through Shen Te is that status should base on talent and not on matters that are beyond one’s control like sex and birth.

Childs further notes that in Scene I of the play, Shen Te (formerly a prostitute) buys a tobacco shop with the money offered to her by the gods. This money she earns by housing the gods for a night: that success is acquired by merit is the idea behind this theme. However, because of her past profession and her sex, she is confronted with discrimination throughout the play. Despite the fact that she is now a respectable woman, her new landlord demands her to pay rent for six months on the spot, simply because she was a prostitute in the past. And it is inevitable that she has Shui Te to bring into effect her rules since no one would follow her orders seriously as she is a female. In the character of Shui Ta, Brecht is out to convey the idea of a society where males of high birth stand superior to the opposite sex of humble birth in the strata of life. This is clearly manifest in the episodes in which Shui Ta takes control of the situations which Shen Te cannot have control of. For instance, he forces the carpenter to accept only twenty silver dollars as compared to the hundred that he demanded before. He also forces her family members out of her house. These are the people who bleached her money and whom Shen Te could not bring to comply with her wishes. This is where we see that Shui Ta wins respect from the people around them because of the fact that he is a man of high birth, one who is well-respected.

Childs argues that by the duality of these characters, what Brecht wants the spectator to be convinced of is that the theory of Social Darwinism is an invalid way of looking at life because the actions of these two individuals do not adhere to the principles of this theory. However, the interesting point the Childs brings forth is that this very duality also sheds off the idea of “better blood” because both of these characters are actually the same blood, that of a woman who has a low birth status and who was a prostitute in the past. Henceforth, within the context of the play, the theory is demonstrated to be illogical. With the use of the device of duality in characters or roll doubling, what Brecht wants to assert is that Social Darwinism can only be validated through the ways in which social practices it: that is, the discrimination of practice in the application of the theory: “Shui Ta is a better person than Shen Te because he is a male of high birth, but in the play, these conditions are based solely on the perceptions of the society, or rather the misperceptions” (p. 02).

Eventually, Childs goes on to strengthen the argument that the thorough analysis from one angle reveals that The Good Woman of Setzuan is a reflection of the perceptions in European society that had begun to change about the reliability of Social Darwinism theory. What was happening at that time was that people from diverse backgrounds and social classes were forced to join hands so that the economic crisis could be fought down; this fight also called out the females of the society into action. This was a newly integrated society with new paradigms of progress and one which discarded such outdated theories as Social Darwinism.

The social upheaval that European society faced as a people in the aftermath of WWI is also majestically represented in the play to let the audience know of the bitterness of the situation which demanded a wave of change, a new angle to see things in a time when there was beginning to take place, in the view of Brecht with his Socialist realism, a paradigm shift. For instance, this would not be wrong to view the searching of the three gods for the existence of some good in the world. And surprisingly they find it in the low-blooded prostitute who, with all her misery, is out to act as a good person to let the gods stay in her house. Here other people are clearly shown as awestruck by the economic crisis that they then faced: they were busier in the struggle of survival than with justifying the ways of good and fighting the evil forces⁵.

Looking at the overall plot of the play also reveals that there are complex questions which cannot be answered up front with the simplicity of linguistic choice or semantics of dramatics. For instance, if we review the character of Shen Te, we find that Brecht offers us a question: is it possible to be good all the time in one’s life; does practicing a good human character in life mean that the individual overlooks their own self-interests? Throughout the play these questions strikingly echo the story. Shen Te is faced with harsh realities of life: that being good all the time is actually being too good for one’s own being. In addition to this, the representation of her alter-ego Shui Ta is actually the portrayal of her self-interests that are needed to be attended to in Shen Te to live at all. Along the same line, we find that this female character cannot live with her good-only view of life because supported by the tactful hand of her cousin (alter-ego), she is still put to suffering by her lover, Yang Sung, the jobless pilot. What more? When eventually, Shen Te is off the scene, the main character is not spared yet: the community people accuse her of murdering her cousin… This is an amazing weaving of strands into strands that knit the fabric of the play into a complex debate of society that needs to reflect on its attitude toward such issues as social status, economic pressures especially on females of low birth and the way good people are treated in the world. Thus the play, in the words of Tucker⁶ is not for the common theatergoer who does not feel ready to indulge into the complexities of such themes as presented in the play. The play, in its real substance, requires an audience that is trained to interpret the various layers of meaning moving around the characters, settings, and situations and can come to make sound judgments because this is what Brecht tried to obtain from his audience.

With regard to Brecht’s genius as reflected in the plays, one question is now frequently asked by the critics: what is the relevance of his plays to the present day world? This question is asked because of the way the modern world turned to. For instance, we can see that technological advances have caused the media to go through a major change in the way of operation. According to Henderson⁷ Brecht would certainly have enjoyed this and come up with more innovative ideas that could enthrall today’s audience were he alive. However, the author raises an important question that despite the argument of Brecht in the huge favor of socialism and equality, today the waves of capitalism have taken up the entire world with full swing: something that Brecht deplored so heavily. Moreover, the ideologies that the writer worshiped have been fairly outdistanced by history. This is where the relevance of his work to today’s time becomes a thorny question. In addition to this, Henderson also asks if “Equally uncertain, in a cultural atmosphere of mass-produced, mind-numbing entertainment, is whether audiences are up for the challenge that Brecht’s plays present” (p. 12). The author relates the experiences of different audiences that he happened to take a view of with regard to Brecht. The issues that the audiences raise are numerous. For instance, Brecht is thought to be difficult; the existing translations of his works are poor, and so forth. The important point that the author critically evaluates in the difficult politics that Brecht loudly spoke of. The troublesome flavor of his politics that shows clear adherence to Marxist-Communist dogma today irritates some people today. Polarized are his views about poverty, wealth; power, powerlessness; and so on. Thus, plays like The Good Woman of Setzuan find difficult grounds in the changed sensibility and scenario of today’s world.

This is also true that some critics regard Brecht’s The Good Woman of Setzuan the weakest of his exile plays because of the fact that the basic notions of the play are strikingly at conflict with today’s ideologies. Today, things are differently viewed from how they were perceived in Brecht’s time. For instance in American society the concept of greed is no more that of the society of Brecht. In the present-day American society greed is actually business success. Besides, the good woman of the play, the protagonist, is the one who can be regarded simply as a person who does not know how to successfully deal with the matters of the world, and not someone who is all so good that gods choose her to offer some power. Polgar⁸ states that such complexities of Brecht’s plays and contradictory trends of social belonging today makes his plays difficult for today’s producers to stage, and difficult for today’s audience to grab with the real essence of meaning. He asserts: “It certainly poses problems for modern producers if it is supposed to raise any meaningful questions about what makes a person good or bad in the light of America’s incredible economic winning streak. Greed was good in the 1980s, remember? Now it isn’t really greed any longer, it’s business success”.

According to my personal analysis of the entire situation, there is no doubt that Brecht’s play The Good Woman of Setzuan is a good example of the fight that is fought by the vocalist of change: change at all levels of life; a change that recognizes human as a human who is equal to each other and not the victim of discrimination. In the central character of the play, I must say that innocence and good are portrayed at the extreme level a common human being can reach. This is one point that, according to my own interpretation, excels all others. I state with the conviction that although Brecht’s theory of favoring Socialism might not be valid today, the credit goes to his acute genius that gave us such pure characters as the good woman of society. Who can deny the fact that this is something that today’s audience cannot help but yearn for? Who doesn’t want to appreciate the extreme innocence of Shen Te that can at least ask us today to think of pure ways of living life? This is one gift that Brecht’s creativity has landed us. This, I must say, is a creation that lasts at least centuries. Another point of argument that I ought to bring forward here is that in today’s capitalistic society it is not safe to say that the future would not follow the kind of social philosophy that Brecht so loudly favored. Thus, it is important to view his plays as masterpieces of art that did have and still have great relevance with society as well.

Mrs. Warren’s Profession by George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw, (1856-1950), an Irish playwright and talented critic, revolutionized the Victorian ways of stage, which was merely a manifestation of artificial flavor of melodramas, by presenting vigorous ideas in dramas. Society and sociological implications are 2 very important aspects that reflect from the long list of the plays on the credit of this playwright. A play like Mrs. Warren’s Profession (1893, produced in 1902) is one shining example of Shaw’s talent at play. Categorized with Philanderer (1893), Mrs. Warren’s Profession is a jibe at the attitude that the Victorians held toward prostitution; moreover, the play takes the issue to sublime heights that open the wary eye. However, this play exceeds from simply being a jibe. It weaves the fabric of meaning of life with sociological themes that are complex yet as real as life itself. There are number of questions asked by Shaw; these questions are so subtle yet so striking that the play stands out to be a masterpiece not only technically but also with the reflection of what society on the whole had to bear for prostitution⁹.

To better analyze the play, it is highly suggestive that the era on the whole must be taken into critical view to understand what kind of social, psychological, and economical forces were at play that shape the typical behavior of the Victorians of that time and how the spokespersons of that society came about arguing their viewpoint. In this regard, Pharand¹⁰ informs us that Victorian society then was a combination of two major forces: self-righteousness and bout, something that led the society to extreme seriousness and over-sentimental attitude toward things. Moreover, the experiences of the society were mixed given the fact that such key elements as imperialism – that offered opportunity and optimism on one side; along with the same lines, the brutality and conflicting aura existed. Then Victorian society confronted the issues of deciding and defining what cultural, moral, social, and psychological values meant for them and in what sense. Whether the values need to be followed in the ways the previous generations had had, or they needed to be redefined given the massive change in the overall outlook of the society with a diverse canvas being painted with different new colors. Society still remembered Romantic yearning for escape from reality, at the same time, there was a strong calling to realism from such landmarks as the French Naturalism; Auguste Comte’s Positivism, Utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham, and of course the major forces of Christianity… all were at play. With the complex climate, society was undergoing a change, an oblique change, in almost all the critical areas. As such Mrs. Warren’s Profession is a play that can be rightly said to mirror all these fears and hopes of society. Prostitution is not seen by Shaw as a profession that is something to be loathed because there are serious questions that the playwright asks from someone who argues for this profession as being bad or tabooed. With this view in mind, it can be argued that the context of the play is provided and that a better understanding of this play and the issues dealt with in it can be born. The result of these doubts is that from the 1860s onwards, novel plots began to reflect a new determinism. With all this going on, gender and identity was a very important question presented to the people who were, with all their traditional fears, shame, and taboos, faced by the Woman Question. Shaw, like other dramatists, is trying to help them reach the answer.

The time Shaw wrote Mrs. Warren’s Profession, according to Liggins (a) ¹¹ (2003) is when the ‘crusade’ for representing social issues like prostitution had started. The time can be roughly outlined as from the 1880s to the 1890s when the public opinion about prostitute was undergoing a change. As such, in this play we see that there is a debate going on with regard to prostitution and social standing of this profession. It is important to mention that Shaw saw prostitution as a result of economic problems that women suffered in society. This has a link with Heurik Ibsen’s popularity in the same context that appealed to the Victorian dramatists who indulged into long and heated debates about this profession. The Mrs. Warren’s Profession is the mouthpiece of Shaw that talks about prostitution as the choice of women in a society that did not entertain other ways for them. In his 1902 Preface to his play Shaw averred that “No normal woman would be a professional prostitute if she could better herself by being respectable”. There is clear reflection of this view in Mrs. Warren’s speeches. The play also portrays the themes of emerging New Woman in society and the prostitute of the very society. Compared with her daughter, Vivie, the mother, Mrs. Warren is also as much a business-lady as the new woman Vivie is. The difference is of profession: one is prostitute and the other is legal actuary in Chancery Lane. Now is this the simple choice of the prostitute that comes into this profession or is this something the society on the whole offers her to be. This is important because we see Mrs. Warren refuses to feel the shame that prostitution carries and is “expected from a woman”. This is mirrored through her narrative in Act II of how she became a prostitute: that she is a self-respecting working female who, like other females, wants to escape economic mistreatment. According to her, prostitution is far better a profession than being a bar-maid, scullery-maid, waitress, or the white-lead factory because this is where her half-sister met tragic end:

“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.”
— George Bernard Shaw, Mrs. Warren’s Profession, (Act II).¹²

We see that Mrs. Kitty Warren has actually dedicated her life for economic security for herself as well as for her daughter. Being the manager of European brothels, the nature of her business and her ambition have made her come to a realization that her career and Vivie’s education have mainly progressed on tracks which are essentially different from each other. There is the reflection of the divide between them which is clearly noticeable when Mrs. Warren returns from her tour to Europe and finds her daughter ready to embark on a career as an accountant. This is where the conflict of New Woman and traditional woman is apparently brought forward. The battle between the mother and the daughter is something that speaks of the hidden pattern of Victorian society that was still in the process of facing change with bravery and realism. Shaw argues that if Vivie, an educated new woman who is nourished with good care, can be as lethal as a woman like Mrs. Warren. Then the argument lies not in what the two women did on their different tracks but what the end result of all these actions would be. It is possible to find a social monster in the well-bred Vivie who can disregard her mother and show scorn for her because of the ways in which she has made her way to this level¹³.

Thus we see Shaw busy in bringing forward the hidden social problems and the mix of situations present to a particular profession. Shaw is not merely arguing for the sake of argument. According to Liggins (a), he had on his side the contemporary Fabian research about work conditions and wages of women in Victorian society. For instance, the barmaid received 4 shillings a week with bed and board that made saving almost out of the question. Moreover, Shaw’s manifest portrayal of the ways philanthropists see the profession, and capitalist society treat a prostitute is also very much evident not only how Mrs. Warren goes about in speaking out about her profession but also what Vivie thinks of her mother. The play as such reflects those underlying themes that were considered as scandalous for society. Moreover, in Act III, when Vivie comes to a revelation that her mother is still harvesting financial gains from her houses, Vivie changes the ways she previously thinks. This is where the New Woman’s disgust is clearly shown and is the representation of what Shaw has to state about the link between the tirade: economic problems, choice of profession, and the way society takes the profession. The ways Shaw portrays the themes and carries on with them can be said to educate the audience to accept what is real; what should be treated as something integral to society rather than taking eyes off it.

It will be equally counterbalancing to view what changes the then society was going through with regard to major issues such as economy, morality, attitude toward certain issues, and how social purists and feminist view these changes. I would like to bring this forward with the view that looking at Shaw’s time from an aerial view is very much significant to bear an understanding and the context of Mrs. Warren’s Profession and the debates that are carried on in the play. In this regard, Lesley Hall ¹⁴ points out to the attitude that nineteenth century historians saw in sexual tendencies in society, and how they relate to them around the time of 1880. According to her this time marks the commencement of the new ways which are modern and treat such issues as sex differently from other periods of time. She reviews texts published from the 1870s to the late 1920s and analyzes this modern way of thinking. The development of psychoanalysis, new science of sexology, the social purity movement, proliferation of more sexually arousing texts, and the rise of the New Woman contributed to the increased and heated public debates that revisited the concept of females sexuality, its link to society, how society treated it, and how people like Shaw see it. This was the very time when feminists and social purists felt highly compelled to talk about sex and to bring forward the silence that surrounded the subject striking the hidden fear, shame, and complexities within this very area. Identification of different sexual behaviors by psychologists came along the way. Thus in Mrs. Warren’s Profession we see that economic hindrance is portrayed as one cause (with others) through which Shaw asks society the question that was a harsh blow in the face of society: the issues of working-class women, the philanthropic projects for fallen women, and the dangers hidden in all these issues are clearly mentioned. This, according to my personal discretion, is one of the attempts that were made in educating the common behavior about the dark portion of society.

It is appropriate to bring forth what critics like Liggins (b)¹⁵ thinks of such attempts in the development of social morality, the reflection of such debates on society, and the contribution of them to social development hold on the whole. According to her, plays like Mrs. Warren’s Profession are a radical representation of the major issues brought forward for the audience. She argues that in the play such themes as the treatment of brothels and demythologization of contemporary illustration or prostitution is over-portrayed which needs to be alerted to a correct understanding. Why Shaw does it is because there were strong waves of social, psychological, and economical change and society was swaying on all these grounds. The author even goes to the extent that she regards the play as a play of ‘sexually explicit’ nature that contributed to ‘the erotic fiction’. The point I would like to raise here is that such a play as Mrs. Warren’s Profession is a representation of stark reality, something individual and society on the whole take too much time to accept as their part of life. It is also possible that such issues are left unattended for a long time. Henceforth, to say that the play is sexually arousing text is to undermine its real significance in relating to the development that English society went through from Victorian time to the present day. Moreover, the debate is also open for generalization to any other nation confronted with such issues. The theme of repression of the New Woman in the play is very much a realistic view of prostitution and how different situations demand to deal with it. However, it can be an apt remark to suggest that it is possible that Shaw wove some strands into the debate only for the sake of eloquence and performance of the play, which is certainly allowed for a play and must be sieved from what the play actually holds for the audience. This is very much clear the this play is one of the series of the texts that provided the ground for redefinition, conceptualizing in a different way of prostitution, economic pressures on women in hard times, and the impact of these repressions on social outlook.

Thus we can say that Mrs. Warren’s Profession is a play that reflects a number of issues that were present to the society. According to Eltis ¹⁶ The play shows scarce optimism on the part of George Bernard Shaw because the way society was evolving, people like Shaw saw the emerging patterns that needed to be addressed with due attention. As we see in the play, Mrs. Warren’s daughter escapes to her respectable profession, closing her eyes from seeing what lies underneath the white fabric of society. This escape has much to do with Shaw who wants the audience to realize that escape will not do; what is important is to be brave enough to confront any challenge like the profession of prostitution and the forces responsible for women to adopt it. Although Mrs. Warren has made a fortune by joining the traditional forces of the system, Shaw clearly shows that she cannot beat the system but is a victim of it. At times it seems that Shaw is favoring escapism because it is a vital choice for someone who is a woman in that society.

References

Childs, Tera. Social Darwinism in The Good Woman of Setzuan. Web.

Demetz, Peter (Editor). Brecht: A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. (1962), pp. 90-110

Eltis, Sos. Daughter: A Story of the Women. (2003). Web.

Henderson, Stephen. The Persistence of Brecht: On the Centennial of His Birth, a New Wave of American Productions Tests Brecht’s Relevance in the ’90S. (May-June, 1998). American Theater. Vol. 15. Iss. 5, p. 12.

Hughes, Darren. The Good Woman of Setzuan. (2003). Web.

Isherwood, Chales. Her Profession, Herself, Her Daughter Problem. (2005).

Lesley Hall, Sex, Gender and Social Change in Britain since 1880 (Houndsmill: Macmillan, 2000), 1.

Liggins (a), Emma. Prostitution and Social Purity in the 1880s and 1890s. Critical Survey. Vol. 15. No. 3. (2003), pp.39+.

Liggins (b), Emma. ‘New’ Female Sexualities, 1870-1930. Critical Survey. Volume: 15. Issue: 3. Publication Year: 2003. Page Number: 1+.

Pharand, Michel. Culture under Pressure. Contributors: English Literature in Transition 1880-1920. Volume: 51. Issue: 1. (2008). Page Number: 109+.

Polgar, Robi. The Good Woman of Setzuan: Just a Quaint Old Story. (2000).

Sommer, Elyse. A Curtain-up Review of The Good Woman of Setzuan (1998).

The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia. Brecht, Bertolt. (2007).

The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition (2007). Encyclopedia Article Title: Shaw, George Bernard. Columbia University Press: New York. Publication Year: 2007.

Tucker, Sarah. Theater Review: ‘Good Woman’ explores intriguing moral battles. (2008). Life and Arts. Web.

Footnotes

1. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia. Brecht, Bertolt. (2007). Web.
2. Hughes, Darren. The Good Woman of Setzuan. (2003). Web.
3. Demetz, Peter (Editor). Brecht: A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. (1962), pp. 90-110.
4. Childs, Tera. Social Darwinism in The Good Woman of Setzuan. Web.
5. Sommer, Elyse. A Curtain up Review of The Good Woman of Setzuan (1998). Web.
6. Tucker, Sarah. Theater Review: ‘Good Woman’ explores intriguing moral battles. (2008). Life and Arts.Web.
7. Henderson, Stephen. The Persistence of Brecht: On the Centennial of His Birth, a New Wave of American Productions Tests Brecht’s Relevance in the ’90S. (1998). American Theater. Vol. 15. Iss. 5, p. 12. Web.
8. Polgar, Robi. The Good Woman of Setzuan: Just a Quaint Old Story. (2000). Web.
9. The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition (2007). Encyclopedia Article Title: Shaw, George Bernard. Columbia University Press: New York. Publication Year: 2007.
10. Pharand, Michel. Culture under Pressure. Contributors: English Literature in Transition 1880-1920. Volume: 51. Issue: 1. (2008). Page Number: 109+.
11. Liggins (a), Emma. Prostitution and Social Purity in the 1880s and 1890s. Critical Survey. Vol. 15. No. 3. (2003), pp.39+.
12. Shaw, George Bernard. Mrs. Warren’s Profession. 1893.
13. Isherwood, Chales. Her Profession, Herself, Her Daugher Problem. (2005). Web.
14. Lesley Hall, Sex, Gender and Social Change in Britain since 1880 (Houndsmill: Macmillan, 2000), 1.
15. ‘New’ Female Sexualities, 1870-1930. Contributors: Emma Liggins – author. Journal Title: Critical Survey. Volume: 15. Issue: 3. Publication Year: 2003. Page Number: 1+.
16. Eltis, Sos. Daughter: A Story of the Women. Web.