Notes For October 28th, 2026

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This Day In Literary History

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On October 28th, 1905, Mrs. Warren's Profession, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Garrick Theater in New York. The play, Shaw's second, was written in 1893.

Banned in Britain by the Lord Chamberlain (England's theater censor) because of its frank depiction of prostitution, the play would finally open in London on January 5th, 1902, behind closed doors at the New Lyric Club - a private, members-only organization.

Private theatrical clubs were exempt from the censorship laws regulating public theaters in England. The play couldn't be legally performed in a British public theater until 1926, when theatrical censorship was less strict.

Mrs. Warren's Profession centers on the relationship between Mrs. Warren, a middle-aged ex-prostitute turned brothel madam, and her prudish, conservative, Cambridge-educated daughter, Vivie.

Mrs. Warren has always hidden the truth about her profession from her daughter. When Vivie discovers that her mother's fortune was really made in the brothel business, she's horrified.

Eventually, the two strong willed women reconcile when Mrs. Warren explains that her childhood, spent in grinding poverty and despair, led her to become a prostitute because it was the only way to support herself. Vivie forgives her - until she finds out that her mother is still running brothels.

Though the play was inspired by Yvette, a novel by the legendary French writer Guy de Maupassant, George Bernard Shaw, a staunch socialist, said that he wrote Mrs. Warren's Profession for this reason:

To draw attention to the truth that prostitution is caused not by female depravity and male licentiousness but simply by underpaying, undervaluing, and overworking women so shamefully that the poorest of them are forced to resort to prostitution to keep body and soul together.

After opening in New York, Mrs. Warren's Profession would close after only one performance, as the play was promptly shut down by puritanical authorities.

A few days later, on October 31st, the producer and the entire cast of actors were arrested for obscenity. Fortunately, they were all acquitted in court - including George Bernard Shaw, who was tried in absentia.

Shaw would go on to write many more classic plays, including Candida (1894), Caesar And Cleopatra (1898), Major Barbara (1905), The Doctor's Dilemma (1906), Fanny's First Play (1911), and Pygmalion (1912), upon which the hit Broadway musical My Fair Lady was based.

In all of his works, Shaw extolled the virtues of socialism and denounced all forms of capitalist exploitation, including the degradation of women. He also drew attention to the effects of poverty, violence, and war on both society and the individual.

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"The secret of success is to offend the greatest number of people."

- George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features a complete live performance of Mrs. Warren's Profession. Enjoy!

Notes For October 28th, 2025

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On October 28th, 1905, Mrs. Warren's Profession, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Garrick Theater in New York. The play, Shaw's second, was written in 1893.

Banned in Britain by the Lord Chamberlain (England's theater censor) because of its frank depiction of prostitution, the play would finally open in London on January 5th, 1902, behind closed doors at the New Lyric Club - a private, members-only organization.

Private theatrical clubs were exempt from the censorship laws regulating public theaters in England. The play couldn't be legally performed in a British public theater until 1926, when theatrical censorship was less strict.

Mrs. Warren's Profession centers on the relationship between Mrs. Warren, a middle-aged ex-prostitute turned brothel madam, and her prudish, conservative, Cambridge-educated daughter, Vivie.

Mrs. Warren has always hidden the truth about her profession from her daughter. When Vivie discovers that her mother's fortune was really made in the brothel business, she's horrified.

Eventually, the two strong willed women reconcile when Mrs. Warren explains that her childhood, spent in grinding poverty and despair, led her to become a prostitute because it was the only way to support herself. Vivie forgives her - until she finds out that her mother is still running brothels.

Though the play was inspired by Yvette, a novel by the legendary French writer Guy de Maupassant, George Bernard Shaw, a staunch socialist, said that he wrote Mrs. Warren's Profession for this reason:

To draw attention to the truth that prostitution is caused not by female depravity and male licentiousness but simply by underpaying, undervaluing, and overworking women so shamefully that the poorest of them are forced to resort to prostitution to keep body and soul together.

After opening in New York, Mrs. Warren's Profession would close after only one performance, as the play was promptly shut down by puritanical authorities.

A few days later, on October 31st, the producer and the entire cast of actors were arrested for obscenity. Fortunately, they were all acquitted in court - including George Bernard Shaw, who was tried in absentia.

Shaw would go on to write many more classic plays, including Candida (1894), Caesar And Cleopatra (1898), Major Barbara (1905), The Doctor's Dilemma (1906), Fanny's First Play (1911), and Pygmalion (1912), upon which the famous, award-winning musical My Fair Lady was based.

In all of his works, Shaw extolled the virtues of socialism and denounced all forms of capitalist exploitation, including the degradation of women. He also drew attention to the effects of poverty, violence, and war on both society and the individual.

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"The secret of success is to offend the greatest number of people."

- George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features a complete live performance of Mrs. Warren's Profession. Enjoy!

Notes For March 15th, 2024

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On March 15th, 1956, My Fair Lady, the acclaimed hit musical based on the classic 1913 play Pygmalion by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened on Broadway.

It premiered at the Mark Hellinger Theatre in New York City. The production then moved to the Broadhurst Theatre, and finally, to the Broadway Theatre, where it closed in 1962 after 2,717 performances.

Set in Edwardian London, My Fair Lady told the story of Henry Higgins, a professor of phonetics who meets a young flower seller named Eliza Dolittle when she tells off a young man named Freddy Eynsford-Hill for spilling her violets. The girl speaks with an ear-torturing Cockney accent, her words full of slang and colloquialisms.

Professor Higgins makes a wager with his linguist friend Colonel Pickering, betting that Eliza could be taught to speak and act like a proper lady, after which, he will introduce her at the Embassy Ball. Pickering doesn't believe that he can make a lady out of such a vulgar girl.

Eliza moves into Higgins' house and begins taking lessons from him. Her father soon pays a visit, concerned that the Professor is compromising her virtue. Higgins buys him off with five pounds.

As Eliza's lessons progress, she grows frustrated and fantasizes about killing Higgins. But soon, the flower seller begins to bloom.

Eliza's first public presentation, at the Ascot Racecourse, proves successful, but then she suffers a relapse, returning to her Cockney vulgarity. This charms Freddy Eynsford-Hill, the young man she had met and scolded earlier. He falls in love with her.

Higgins continues with Eliza's lessons. She faces her final test at the Embassy Ball and passes with flying colors. Afterward, Colonel Pickering praises Higgins for his triumph in making a lady out of Eliza.

When she learns of their bet, she feels that Higgins used her and is now abandoning her. Their relationship ends when Higgins insults Eliza and she storms off. Soon, even Colonel Pickering becomes annoyed with Higgins, who has always been a self-absorbed misogynist.

When Eliza plans to marry Freddy Eynsford-Hill, Higgins realizes that he loves her, but can't bring himself to confess his true feelings to her. The musical ends on an ambiguous note, suggesting a possible reconciliation between Higgins and Eliza.

My Fair Lady became a huge hit, one of Broadway's most famous and popular musicals. It was written by the legendary team of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Lowe.

The original cast featured Rex Harrison as Professor Higgins, and a young, virtually unknown British actress named Julie Andrews as Eliza. The Original Cast Recording was the best selling album of 1957 and 1958.

George Bernard Shaw died in 1950; he didn't live to see the Broadway musical adaptation of his play, Pygmalion. Had he lived, there wouldn't have been a musical for him to see.

In 1908, Shaw's classic play The Chocolate Soldier was adapted as an operetta, and he hated it so much that he vowed that none of his plays would ever be set to music again. He kept that vow for the rest of his life.

In 1964, eight years after the musical debuted on Broadway, My Fair Lady was adapted as a feature film, directed by George Cukor.

Rex Harrison reprised his role as Professor Higgins, but producer / studio boss Jack Warner cast Audrey Hepburn as Eliza Dolittle instead of Julie Andrews.

This decision angered fans of the musical, but Warner was concerned that casting Andrews would be risky because she had no film experience. Then he found that Audrey Hepburn couldn't sing, so her vocals had to be dubbed by Marni Nixon.

But Julie Andrews got the last laugh; she gave an Oscar winning performance in the title role of the classic Disney movie musical Mary Poppins that year - beating Hepburn for the Academy Award!

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"All great truths begin as blasphemies."

- George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features a complete live performance of My Fair Lady. Enjoy!

Notes For March 15th, 2023

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On March 15th, 1956, My Fair Lady, the acclaimed hit musical based on the classic 1913 play Pygmalion by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened on Broadway.

It premiered at the Mark Hellinger Theatre in New York City. The production then moved to the Broadhurst Theatre, and finally, to the Broadway Theatre, where it closed in 1962 after 2,717 performances.

Set in Edwardian London, My Fair Lady told the story of Henry Higgins, a professor of phonetics who meets a young flower seller named Eliza Dolittle when she tells off a young man named Freddy Eynsford-Hill for spilling her violets.

The ill-mannered Eliza speaks with an ear-torturing Cockney accent, her words filled with slang expressions and colloquialisms.

Professor Higgins makes a wager with his linguist friend Colonel Pickering, betting that Eliza could be taught to speak and act like a proper lady, after which, he will introduce her at the Embassy Ball. Pickering doesn't believe that he can make a lady out of such a vulgar girl.

Eliza moves into Higgins' house and begins taking lessons from him. Her father soon pays a visit, concerned that the Professor is compromising her virtue. Higgins buys him off with five pounds.

As Eliza's lessons progress, she grows frustrated and fantasizes about killing Higgins. But soon, the flower seller begins to bloom.

Eliza's first public presentation, at the Ascot Racecourse, proves successful, but then she suffers a relapse, returning to her Cockney vulgarity. This charms Freddy Eynsford-Hill, the young man she had met and scolded earlier. He falls in love with her.

Higgins continues with Eliza's lessons. She faces her final test at the Embassy Ball and passes with flying colors. Afterward, Colonel Pickering praises Higgins for his triumph in making a lady out of Eliza.

When she learns of their bet, she feels that Higgins used her and is now abandoning her. Their relationship ends in a huff when Higgins insults Eliza and she storms off. Soon, even Colonel Pickering becomes annoyed with Higgins, who has always been a self-absorbed misogynist.

When Eliza plans to marry Freddy Eynsford-Hill, Higgins realizes that he loves her, but can't bring himself to confess his true feelings to her. The musical ends on an ambiguous note, suggesting a possible reconciliation between Higgins and Eliza.

My Fair Lady became a huge hit, one of Broadway's most famous and popular musicals. It was written by the legendary team of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Lowe.

The original cast featured Rex Harrison as Professor Higgins, and a young, virtually unknown British actress named Julie Andrews as Eliza. The Original Cast Recording became the best selling album of 1957 and 1958.

George Bernard Shaw died in 1950; he never lived to see the Broadway musical adaptation of his play, Pygmalion. If he had, there wouldn't have been a musical for him to see.

In 1908, Shaw's classic play The Chocolate Soldier was adapted as an operetta, and he hated it so much that he vowed that none of his plays would ever be set to music again. He kept that vow for the rest of his life.

In 1964, eight years after the musical debuted on Broadway, My Fair Lady was adapted as a feature film, directed by George Cukor.

Rex Harrison reprised his role as Professor Higgins, but producer and studio boss Jack Warner decided to cast Audrey Hepburn as Eliza Dolittle instead of Julie Andrews.

This decision angered fans of the musical, but Warner was concerned that casting Andrews would be risky because she had no film experience. Then he found that Audrey Hepburn couldn't sing, so her vocals had to be dubbed by Marni Nixon.

But Julie Andrews got the last laugh - she gave an Oscar winning performance in the title role of the classic Disney movie musical Mary Poppins that year - beating Hepburn for the Academy Award!

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"All great truths begin as blasphemies." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features a complete live performance of My Fair Lady. Enjoy!

Notes For October 28th. 2022

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On October 28th, 1905, Mrs. Warren's Profession, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Garrick Theater in New York. The play, Shaw's second, was written in 1893.

Banned in Britain by the Lord Chamberlain (England's theater censor) because of its frank depiction of prostitution, the play would finally open in London on January 5th, 1902, behind closed doors at the New Lyric Club - a private, members-only organization.

Private theatrical clubs were exempt from the censorship laws regulating public theaters in England. The play couldn't be legally performed in a British public theater until 1926, when theatrical censorship was less strict.

Mrs. Warren's Profession centers on the relationship between Mrs. Warren, a middle-aged ex-prostitute turned brothel madam, and her prudish, conservative, Cambridge-educated daughter, Vivie.

Mrs. Warren has always hidden the truth about her profession from her daughter. When Vivie discovers that her mother's fortune was really made in the brothel business, she's horrified.

Eventually, the two strong willed women reconcile when Mrs. Warren explains that her childhood, spent in grinding poverty and despair, led her to become a prostitute because it was the only way to support herself. Vivie forgives her - until she finds out that Mom is still running brothels.

Though the play was inspired by Yvette, a novel by the legendary French writer Guy de Maupassant, George Bernard Shaw, a staunch socialist, said that he wrote Mrs. Warren's Profession for this reason:

To draw attention to the truth that prostitution is caused not by female depravity and male licentiousness but simply by underpaying, undervaluing, and overworking women so shamefully that the poorest of them are forced to resort to prostitution to keep body and soul together.

After opening in New York, Mrs. Warren's Profession would close after only one performance, as the play was promptly shut down by puritanical authorities.

A few days later, on October 31st, the producer and the entire cast of actors were arrested for obscenity. Fortunately, they were all acquitted of the charge in court - including George Bernard Shaw, who was tried in absentia.

Shaw would go on to write many more classic plays, including Candida (1894), Caesar And Cleopatra (1898), Major Barbara (1905), The Doctor's Dilemma (1906), Fanny's First Play (1911), and Pygmalion (1912), upon which the famous, award-winning musical My Fair Lady was based.

In all of his works, Shaw extolled the virtues of socialism and denounced all forms of capitalist exploitation, including the degradation of women. He also drew attention to the effects of poverty, violence, and war on both society and the individual.

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"The secret of success is to offend the greatest number of people." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features a complete live performance of Mrs. Warren's Profession. Enjoy!

Notes For April 21st, 2022

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On April 21st, 1894, Arms and the Man, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Playhouse Theatre in London.

Arms and the Man (the title comes from the opening words of Virgil's Aeneid) was set during the 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian War. The play's heroine is a Bulgarian girl, Raina Petkoff. Her fiance is Sergius Saranoff, a war hero whom she idolizes.

One night, Captain Bluntschli, a Swiss mercenary soldier in the Serbian army, bursts in through Raina's bedroom window. After threatening her, Bluntschli begs Raina to hide him.

She complies, though she thinks he's a coward - especially when he tells her that he is armed with chocolates instead of bullets. After the battle dies down, Raina and her mother sneak Bluntschli out of the house, disguising him in a housecoat.

The war ends and Sergius returns to Raina - and flirts with her servant girl Louka. Raina finds the man she once idolized to be tiresome and foolhardy. Then, Bluntschli unexpectedly returns to give Raina back the housecoat.

Raina comes to realize that Bluntschli respects her as a woman, where Sergius does not. She tells Bluntschli that she left a picture of herself in a pocket of the housecoat for him, with the inscription "To my chocolate-cream soldier." Unfortunately, Bluntschli never found it.

Later, Bluntschli receives word that his father has died and he has inherited considerable wealth. Louka then tells Sergius that Bluntschli was the man whom Raina protected - and is in love with.

Sergius challenges Bluntschli to a duel, but the men avoid fighting when Sergius and Raina break off their engagement amicably. To Raina's father's horror, Sergius proposes to Louka.

Meanwhile, Bluntschli is now a wealthy businessman. Raina, recognizing the shallowness of her romantic ideals and her ex-fiance's values, tells him that she would rather have her poor chocolate-cream soldier instead.

He convinces her that he's still the same person. The play ends with Raina proclaiming her love for Bluntschli, who then proclaims to everyone that he will marry Raina when he returns in two weeks.

The opening performance of Arms and the Man received a standing ovation - and loud boos from one lone heckler, to whom the playwright quipped, "My dear fellow, I quite agree with you, but what are we two against so many?"

When a group of Bulgarian students complained about Shaw using their country's military history as a vehicle for satirizing the absurdities of war, the playwright made the following apology:

I greatly regret that my play, Arms and the Man, has wounded the susceptibilities of Bulgarian students in Berlin and Vienna. But I ask them to remember that it is the business of the writer of comedy to wound the susceptibilities of his audience. When the Bulgarian students, with my friendly assistance, have developed a sense of humor, there will be no more trouble.

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"Censorship ends in logical completeness when nobody is allowed to read any books except the books that nobody reads." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video a complete performance of George Bernard Shaw's classic play, Arms and the Man, taped live in London. Enjoy!

Notes For March 15th, 2022

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On March 15th, 1956, My Fair Lady, the acclaimed hit musical based on the classic play Pygmalion by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened on Broadway.

It premiered at the Mark Hellinger Theatre in New York City. The production then moved to the Broadhurst Theatre, and finally, to the Broadway Theatre, where it closed in 1962 after 2,717 performances.

Set in Edwardian London, My Fair Lady told the story of Henry Higgins, a professor of phonetics who meets a young flower seller named Eliza Dolittle when she tells off a young man named Freddy Eynsford-Hill for spilling her violets.

The ill-mannered Eliza speaks with an ear-torturing Cockney accent, her words filled with slang expressions and colloquialisms.

Professor Higgins makes a wager with his linguist friend Colonel Pickering, betting that Eliza could be taught to speak and act like a proper lady, after which, he will introduce her at the Embassy Ball. Pickering doesn't believe that he can make a lady out of such a vulgar girl.

Eliza moves into Higgins' house and begins taking lessons from him. Her father soon pays a visit, concerned that the Professor is compromising her virtue. Higgins buys him off with five pounds.

As Eliza's lessons progress, she grows frustrated and fantasizes about killing Higgins. But soon, the flower seller begins to bloom.

Eliza's first public presentation, at the Ascot Racecourse, proves successful, but then she suffers a relapse, returning to her Cockney vulgarity. This charms Freddy Eynsford-Hill, the young man she had met and scolded earlier. He falls in love with her.

Higgins continues with Eliza's lessons. She faces her final test at the Embassy Ball and passes with flying colors. Afterward, Colonel Pickering praises Higgins for his triumph in making a lady out of Eliza.

When she learns of their bet, she feels that Higgins used her and is now abandoning her. Their relationship ends in a huff when Higgins insults Eliza and she storms off. Soon, even Colonel Pickering becomes annoyed with Higgins, who has always been a self-absorbed misogynist.

When Eliza plans to marry Freddy Eynsford-Hill, Higgins realizes that he loves her, but can't bring himself to confess his true feelings to her. The musical ends on an ambiguous note, suggesting a possible reconciliation between Higgins and Eliza.

My Fair Lady became a huge hit, one of Broadway's most famous and popular musicals. It was written by the legendary team of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Lowe.

The original cast featured Rex Harrison as Professor Higgins, and a young, virtually unknown British actress named Julie Andrews as Eliza. The Original Cast Recording became the best selling album of 1957 and 1958.

George Bernard Shaw died in 1950; he never lived to see the Broadway musical adaptation of his play, Pygmalion. If he had, there wouldn't have been a musical for him to see.

In 1908, Shaw's classic play The Chocolate Soldier was adapted as an operetta, and he hated it so much that he vowed that none of his plays would ever be set to music again. He kept that vow for the rest of his life.

In 1964, eight years after the musical debuted on Broadway, My Fair Lady was adapted as a feature film, directed by George Cukor.

Rex Harrison reprised his role as Professor Higgins, but producer and studio boss Jack Warner decided to cast Audrey Hepburn as Eliza Dolittle instead of Julie Andrews.

This decision angered fans of the musical, but Warner was concerned that casting Andrews would be risky because she had no film experience. Then he found that Audrey Hepburn couldn't sing, so her vocals had to be dubbed by Marni Nixon.

But Julie Andrews got the last laugh - she gave an Oscar winning performance in the title role of the classic Disney movie musical Mary Poppins - beating Hepburn for the Academy Award!

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"All great truths begin as blasphemies." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features a complete live performance of My Fair Lady. Enjoy!

Notes For October 28th, 2021

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On October 28th, 1905, Mrs. Warren's Profession, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Garrick Theater in New York. The play, Shaw's second, was written in 1893.

Banned in Britain by the Lord Chamberlain (England's theater censor) because of its frank depiction of prostitution, the play would finally open in London on January 5th, 1902, behind closed doors at the New Lyric Club - a private, members-only organization.

Private theatrical clubs were exempt from the censorship laws regulating public theaters in England. The play couldn't be legally performed in a British public theater until 1926, when theatrical censorship was less strict.

Mrs. Warren's Profession centers on the relationship between Mrs. Warren, a middle-aged ex-prostitute turned brothel madam, and her prudish, conservative, Cambridge-educated daughter, Vivie.

Mrs. Warren has always hidden the truth about her profession from her daughter. When Vivie discovers that her mother's fortune was really made in the brothel business, she's horrified.

Eventually, the two strong willed women reconcile when Mrs. Warren explains that her childhood, spent in grinding poverty and despair, led her to become a prostitute because it was the only way to support herself. Vivie forgives her - until she finds out that Mom is still running brothels.

Though the play was inspired by Yvette, a novel by the legendary French writer Guy de Maupassant, George Bernard Shaw, a staunch socialist, said that he wrote Mrs. Warren's Profession for this reason:

To draw attention to the truth that prostitution is caused not by female depravity and male licentiousness but simply by underpaying, undervaluing, and overworking women so shamefully that the poorest of them are forced to resort to prostitution to keep body and soul together.

After opening in New York, Mrs. Warren's Profession would close after only one performance, as the play was promptly shut down by puritanical authorities.

A few days later, on October 31st, the producer and the entire cast of actors were arrested for obscenity. Fortunately, they were all acquitted of the charge in court - including George Bernard Shaw, who was tried in absentia.

Shaw would go on to write many more classic plays, including Candida (1894), Caesar And Cleopatra (1898), Major Barbara (1905), The Doctor's Dilemma (1906), Fanny's First Play (1911), and Pygmalion (1912), upon which the famous, award-winning musical My Fair Lady was based.

In all of his works, Shaw extolled the virtues of socialism and denounced all forms of capitalist exploitation, including the degradation of women. He also drew attention to the effects of poverty, violence, and war on both society and the individual.

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"The secret of success is to offend the greatest number of people." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features a complete live performance of Mrs. Warren's Profession. Enjoy!

Notes For April 21st, 2021

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On April 21st, 1894, Arms and the Man, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Playhouse Theatre in London.

Arms and the Man (the title comes from the opening words of Virgil's Aeneid) was set during the 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian War. The play's heroine is a Bulgarian girl, Raina Petkoff. Her fiance is Sergius Saranoff, a war hero whom she idolizes.

One night, Captain Bluntschli, a Swiss mercenary soldier in the Serbian army, bursts in through Raina's bedroom window. After threatening her, Bluntschli begs Raina to hide him.

She complies, though she thinks he's a coward - especially when he tells her that he is armed with chocolates instead of bullets. After the battle dies down, Raina and her mother sneak Bluntschli out of the house, disguising him in a housecoat.

The war ends and Sergius returns to Raina - and flirts with her servant girl Louka. Raina finds the man she once idolized to be tiresome and foolhardy. Then, Bluntschli unexpectedly returns to give Raina back the housecoat.

Raina comes to realize that Bluntschli respects her as a woman, where Sergius does not. She tells Bluntschli that she left a picture of herself in a pocket of the housecoat for him, with the inscription "To my chocolate-cream soldier." Unfortunately, Bluntschli never found it.

Later, Bluntschli receives word that his father has died and he has inherited considerable wealth. Louka then tells Sergius that Bluntschli was the man whom Raina protected - and is in love with.

Sergius challenges Bluntschli to a duel, but the men avoid fighting when Sergius and Raina break off their engagement amicably. To Raina's father's horror, Sergius proposes to Louka.

Meanwhile, Bluntschli is now a wealthy businessman. Raina, recognizing the shallowness of her romantic ideals and her ex-fiance's values, tells him that she would rather have her poor chocolate-cream soldier instead.

He convinces her that he's still the same person. The play ends with Raina proclaiming her love for Bluntschli, who then proclaims to everyone that he will marry Raina when he returns in two weeks.

The opening performance of Arms and the Man received a standing ovation - and loud boos from one lone heckler, to whom the playwright quipped, "My dear fellow, I quite agree with you, but what are we two against so many?"

When a group of Bulgarian students complained about Shaw using their country's military history as a vehicle for satirizing the absurdities of war, the playwright made the following apology:

I greatly regret that my play, Arms and the Man, has wounded the susceptibilities of Bulgarian students in Berlin and Vienna. But I ask them to remember that it is the business of the writer of comedy to wound the susceptibilities of his audience. When the Bulgarian students, with my friendly assistance, have developed a sense of humor, there will be no more trouble.

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"Censorship ends in logical completeness when nobody is allowed to read any books except the books that nobody reads." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video a complete performance of George Bernard Shaw's classic play, Arms and the Man, taped live in London. Enjoy!

Notes For October 28th, 2020

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On October 28th, 1905, Mrs. Warren's Profession, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Garrick Theater in New York. The play, Shaw's second, was written in 1893.

Banned in Britain by the Lord Chamberlain (England's theater censor) because of its frank depiction of prostitution, the play would finally open in London on January 5th, 1902, behind closed doors at the New Lyric Club - a private, members-only organization.

Private theatrical clubs were exempt from the censorship laws regulating public theaters in England. The play couldn't be legally performed in a British public theater until 1926, when theatrical censorship was less strict.

Mrs. Warren's Profession centers on the relationship between Mrs. Warren, a middle-aged ex-prostitute turned brothel madam, and her prudish, conservative, Cambridge-educated daughter, Vivie.

Mrs. Warren has always hidden the truth about her profession from her daughter. When Vivie discovers that her mother's fortune was really made in the brothel business, she's horrified.

Eventually, the two strong willed women reconcile when Mrs. Warren explains that her childhood, spent in grinding poverty and despair, led her to become a prostitute because it was the only way to support herself. Vivie forgives her - until she finds out that Mom is still running brothels.

Though the play was inspired by Yvette, a novel by the legendary French writer Guy de Maupassant, George Bernard Shaw, a staunch socialist, said that he wrote Mrs. Warren's Profession for this reason:

To draw attention to the truth that prostitution is caused not by female depravity and male licentiousness but simply by underpaying, undervaluing, and overworking women so shamefully that the poorest of them are forced to resort to prostitution to keep body and soul together.

After opening in New York, Mrs. Warren's Profession would close after only one performance, as the play was promptly shut down by puritanical authorities.

A few days later, on October 31st, the producer and the entire cast of actors were arrested for obscenity. Fortunately, they were all acquitted of the charge in court - including George Bernard Shaw, who was tried in absentia.

Shaw would go on to write many more classic plays, including Candida (1894), Caesar And Cleopatra (1898), Major Barbara (1905), The Doctor's Dilemma (1906), Fanny's First Play (1911), and Pygmalion (1912), upon which the famous, award-winning musical My Fair Lady was based.

In all of his works, Shaw extolled the virtues of socialism and denounced all forms of capitalist exploitation, including the degradation of women. He also drew attention to the effects of poverty, violence, and war on both society and the individual.

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"The secret of success is to offend the greatest number of people." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features a complete live performance of Mrs. Warren's Profession. Enjoy!

Notes For April 21st, 2020

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On April 21st, 1894, Arms and the Man, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Playhouse Theatre in London.

Arms and the Man (the title comes from the opening words of Virgil's Aeneid) was set during the 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian War. The play's heroine is a Bulgarian girl, Raina Petkoff. Her fiance is Sergius Saranoff, a war hero whom she idolizes.

One night, Captain Bluntschli, a Swiss mercenary soldier in the Serbian army, bursts in through Raina's bedroom window. After threatening her, Bluntschli begs Raina to hide him.

She complies, though she thinks he's a coward - especially when he tells her that he is armed with chocolates instead of bullets. After the battle dies down, Raina and her mother sneak Bluntschli out of the house, disguising him in a housecoat.

The war ends and Sergius returns to Raina - and flirts with her servant girl Louka. Raina finds the man she once idolized to be tiresome and foolhardy. Then, Bluntschli unexpectedly returns to give Raina back the housecoat.

Raina comes to realize that Bluntschli respects her as a woman, where Sergius does not. She tells Bluntschli that she left a picture of herself in a pocket of the housecoat for him, with the inscription "To my chocolate-cream soldier." Unfortunately, Bluntschli never found it.

Later, Bluntschli receives word that his father has died and he has inherited considerable wealth. Louka then tells Sergius that Bluntschli was the man whom Raina protected - and is in love with.

Sergius challenges Bluntschli to a duel, but the men avoid fighting when Sergius and Raina break off their engagement amicably. To Raina's father's horror, Sergius proposes to Louka.

Meanwhile, Bluntschli is now a wealthy businessman. Raina, recognizing the shallowness of her romantic ideals and her ex-fiance's values, tells him that she would rather have her poor chocolate-cream soldier instead.

He convinces her that he's still the same person. The play ends with Raina proclaiming her love for Bluntschli, who then proclaims to everyone that he will marry Raina when he returns in two weeks.

The opening performance of Arms and the Man received a standing ovation - and loud boos from one lone heckler, to whom the playwright quipped, "My dear fellow, I quite agree with you, but what are we two against so many?"

When a group of Bulgarian students complained about Shaw using their country's military history as a vehicle for satirizing the absurdities of war, the playwright made the following apology:

I greatly regret that my play, Arms and the Man, has wounded the susceptibilities of Bulgarian students in Berlin and Vienna. But I ask them to remember that it is the business of the writer of comedy to wound the susceptibilities of his audience. When the Bulgarian students, with my friendly assistance, have developed a sense of humor, there will be no more trouble.

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"Censorship ends in logical completeness when nobody is allowed to read any books except the books that nobody reads." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video a complete performance of George Bernard Shaw's classic play, Arms and the Man, taped live in London. Enjoy!

Notes For March 15th, 2019

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On March 15th, 1956, My Fair Lady, the acclaimed hit musical based on the classic play Pygmalion by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened on Broadway.

It premiered at the Mark Hellinger Theatre in New York City. The production then moved to the Broadhurst Theatre, and finally, to the Broadway Theatre, where it closed in 1962 after 2,717 performances.

Set in Edwardian London, My Fair Lady told the story of Henry Higgins, a professor of phonetics who meets a young flower seller named Eliza Dolittle when she tells off a young man named Freddy Eynsford-Hill for spilling her violets.

The ill-mannered Eliza speaks with an ear-torturing Cockney accent, her words filled with slang expressions and colloquialisms.

Professor Higgins makes a wager with his linguist friend Colonel Pickering, betting that Eliza could be taught to speak and act like a proper lady, after which, he will introduce her at the Embassy Ball. Pickering doesn't believe that he can make a lady out of such a vulgar girl.

Eliza moves into Higgins' house and begins taking lessons from him. Her father soon pays a visit, concerned that the Professor is compromising her virtue. Higgins buys him off with five pounds.

As Eliza's lessons progress, she grows frustrated and fantasizes about killing Higgins. But soon, the flower seller begins to bloom.

Eliza's first public presentation, at the Ascot Racecourse, proves successful, but then she suffers a relapse, returning to her Cockney vulgarity. This charms Freddy Eynsford-Hill, the young man she had met and scolded earlier. He falls in love with her.

Higgins continues with Eliza's lessons. She faces her final test at the Embassy Ball and passes with flying colors. Afterward, Colonel Pickering praises Higgins for his triumph in making a lady out of Eliza.

When she learns of their bet, she feels that Higgins used her and is now abandoning her. Their relationship ends in a huff when Higgins insults Eliza and she storms off. Soon, even Colonel Pickering becomes annoyed with Higgins, who has always been a self-absorbed misogynist.

When Eliza plans to marry Freddy Eynsford-Hill, Higgins realizes that he loves her, but can't bring himself to confess his true feelings to her. The musical ends on an ambiguous note, suggesting a possible reconciliation between Higgins and Eliza.

My Fair Lady became a huge hit, one of Broadway's most famous and popular musicals. It was written by the legendary team of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Lowe.

The original cast featured Rex Harrison as Professor Higgins, and a young, virtually unknown British actress named Julie Andrews as Eliza. The Original Cast Recording became the best selling album of 1957 and 1958.

George Bernard Shaw died in 1950; he never lived to see the Broadway musical adaptation of his play, Pygmalion. If he had, there wouldn't have been a musical for him to see.

In 1908, Shaw's classic play The Chocolate Soldier was adapted as an operetta, and he hated it so much that he vowed that none of his plays would ever be set to music again. He kept that vow for the rest of his life.

In 1964, eight years after the musical debuted on Broadway, My Fair Lady was adapted as a feature film, directed by George Cukor.

Rex Harrison reprised his role as Professor Higgins, but producer and studio boss Jack Warner decided to cast Audrey Hepburn as Eliza Dolittle instead of Julie Andrews.

This decision angered fans of the musical, but Warner was concerned that casting Andrews would be risky because she had no film experience. Then he found that Audrey Hepburn couldn't sing, so her vocals had to be dubbed by Marni Nixon.

But Julie Andrews got the last laugh - she gave an Oscar winning performance in the classic Disney movie musical Mary Poppins - beating Hepburn for the Academy Award!

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"All great truths begin as blasphemies." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features the first act of a recent Broadway revival of My Fair Lady. Enjoy!

Notes For March 15th, 2018

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On March 15th, 1956, My Fair Lady, the acclaimed hit musical based on the classic play Pygmalion by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened on Broadway.

It premiered at the Mark Hellinger Theatre in New York City. The production then moved to the Broadhurst Theatre, and finally, to the Broadway Theatre, where it closed in 1962 after 2,717 performances.

Set in Edwardian London, My Fair Lady told the story of Henry Higgins, a professor of phonetics who meets a young flower seller named Eliza Dolittle when she tells off a young man named Freddy Eynsford-Hill for spilling her violets.

The ill-mannered Eliza speaks with an ear-torturing Cockney accent, her words filled with slang expressions and colloquialisms.

Professor Higgins makes a wager with his linguist friend Colonel Pickering, betting that Eliza could be taught to speak and act like a proper lady, after which, he will introduce her at the Embassy Ball. Pickering doesn't believe that he can make a lady out of such a vulgar girl.

Eliza moves into Higgins' house and begins taking lessons from him. Her father soon pays a visit, concerned that the Professor is compromising her virtue. Higgins buys him off with five pounds.

As Eliza's lessons progress, she grows frustrated and fantasizes about killing Higgins. But soon, the flower seller begins to bloom.

Eliza's first public presentation, at the Ascot Racecourse, proves successful, but then she suffers a relapse, returning to her Cockney vulgarity. This charms Freddy Eynsford-Hill, the young man she had met and scolded earlier. He falls in love with her.

Higgins continues with Eliza's lessons. She faces her final test at the Embassy Ball and passes with flying colors. Afterward, Colonel Pickering praises Higgins for his triumph in making a lady out of Eliza.

When she learns of their bet, she feels that Higgins used her and is now abandoning her. Their relationship ends in a huff when Higgins insults Eliza and she storms off. Soon, even Colonel Pickering becomes annoyed with Higgins, who has always been a self-absorbed misogynist.

When Eliza plans to marry Freddy Eynsford-Hill, Higgins realizes that he loves her, but can't bring himself to confess his true feelings to her. The musical ends on an ambiguous note, suggesting a possible reconciliation between Higgins and Eliza.

My Fair Lady became a huge hit, one of Broadway's most famous and popular musicals. It was written by the legendary team of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Lowe.

The original cast featured Rex Harrison as Professor Higgins, and a young, virtually unknown British actress named Julie Andrews as Eliza. The Original Cast Recording became the best selling album of 1957 and 1958.

George Bernard Shaw died in 1950; he never lived to see the Broadway musical adaptation of his play, Pygmalion. If he had, there wouldn't have been a musical for him to see.

In 1908, Shaw's classic play The Chocolate Soldier was adapted as an operetta, and he hated it so much that he vowed that none of his plays would ever be set to music again. He kept that vow for the rest of his life.

In 1964, eight years after the musical debuted on Broadway, My Fair Lady was adapted as a feature film, directed by George Cukor.

Rex Harrison reprised his role as Professor Higgins, but producer and studio boss Jack Warner decided to cast Audrey Hepburn as Eliza Dolittle instead of Julie Andrews.

This decision angered fans of the musical, but Warner was concerned that casting Andrews would be risky because she had no film experience. Then he found that Audrey Hepburn couldn't sing, so her vocals had to be dubbed by Marni Nixon.

But Julie Andrews got the last laugh - she gave an Oscar winning performance in the classic Disney movie musical Mary Poppins - beating Hepburn for the Academy Award!

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"All great truths begin as blasphemies." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features the original theatrical trailer for the 1964 feature film adaptation of My Fair Lady. Enjoy!

Notes For April 21st, 2017

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On April 21st, 1894, Arms and the Man, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Playhouse Theatre in London.

Arms and the Man (the title comes from the opening words of Virgil's Aeneid) was set during the 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian War. The play's heroine is a Bulgarian girl, Raina Petkoff. Her fiance is Sergius Saranoff, a war hero whom she idolizes.

One night, Captain Bluntschli, a Swiss mercenary soldier in the Serbian army, bursts in through Raina's bedroom window. After threatening her, Bluntschli begs Raina to hide him.

She complies, though she thinks he's a coward - especially when he tells her that he is armed with chocolates instead of bullets. After the battle dies down, Raina and her mother sneak Bluntschli out of the house, disguising him in a housecoat.

The war ends and Sergius returns to Raina - and flirts with her servant girl Louka. Raina finds the man she once idolized to be tiresome and foolhardy. Then, Bluntschli unexpectedly returns to give Raina back the housecoat.

Raina comes to realize that Bluntschli respects her as a woman, where Sergius does not. She tells Bluntschli that she left a picture of herself in a pocket of the housecoat for him, with the inscription "To my chocolate-cream soldier." Unfortunately, Bluntschli never found it.

Later, Bluntschli receives word that his father has died and he has inherited considerable wealth. Louka then tells Sergius that Bluntschli was the man whom Raina protected - and is in love with.

Sergius challenges Bluntschli to a duel, but the men avoid fighting when Sergius and Raina break off their engagement amicably. To Raina's father's horror, Sergius proposes to Louka.

Meanwhile, Bluntschli is now a wealthy businessman. Raina, recognizing the shallowness of her romantic ideals and her ex-fiance's values, tells him that she would rather have her poor chocolate-cream soldier instead.

He convinces her that he's still the same person. The play ends with Raina proclaiming her love for Bluntschli, who then proclaims to everyone that he will marry Raina when he returns in two weeks.

The opening performance of Arms and the Man received a standing ovation - and loud boos from one lone heckler, to whom the playwright quipped, "My dear fellow, I quite agree with you, but what are we two against so many?"

When a group of Bulgarian students complained about Shaw using their country's military history as a vehicle for satirizing the absurdities of war, the playwright made the following apology:

I greatly regret that my play, Arms and the Man, has wounded the susceptibilities of Bulgarian students in Berlin and Vienna. But I ask them to remember that it is the business of the writer of comedy to wound the susceptibilities of his audience. When the Bulgarian students, with my friendly assistance, have developed a sense of humor, there will be no more trouble.

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"Censorship ends in logical completeness when nobody is allowed to read any books except the books that nobody reads." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video a complete performance of George Bernard Shaw's classic play, Arms and the Man, taped live in London. Enjoy!

Notes For March 15th, 2017

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On March 15th, 1956, My Fair Lady, the acclaimed hit musical based on the classic play Pygmalion by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened on Broadway.

It premiered at the Mark Hellinger Theatre in New York City. The production then moved to the Broadhurst Theatre, and finally, to the Broadway Theatre, where it closed in 1962 after 2,717 performances.

Set in Edwardian London, My Fair Lady told the story of Henry Higgins, a professor of phonetics who meets a young flower seller named Eliza Dolittle when she tells off a young man named Freddy Eynsford-Hill for spilling her violets.

The ill-mannered Eliza speaks with an ear-torturing Cockney accent, her words filled with slang expressions and colloquialisms.

Professor Higgins makes a wager with his linguist friend Colonel Pickering, betting that Eliza could be taught to speak and act like a proper lady, after which, he will introduce her at the Embassy Ball. Pickering doesn't believe that he can make a lady out of such a vulgar girl.

Eliza moves into Higgins' house and begins taking lessons from him. Her father soon pays a visit, concerned that the Professor is compromising her virtue. Higgins buys him off with five pounds.

As Eliza's lessons progress, she grows frustrated and fantasizes about killing Higgins. But soon, the flower seller begins to bloom.

Eliza's first public presentation, at the Ascot Racecourse, proves successful, but then she suffers a relapse, returning to her Cockney vulgarity. This charms Freddy Eynsford-Hill, the young man she had met and scolded earlier. He falls in love with her.

Higgins continues with Eliza's lessons. She faces her final test at the Embassy Ball and passes with flying colors. Afterward, Colonel Pickering praises Higgins for his triumph in making a lady out of Eliza.

When she learns of their bet, she feels that Higgins used her and is now abandoning her. Their relationship ends in a huff when Higgins insults Eliza and she storms off. Soon, even Colonel Pickering becomes annoyed with Higgins, who has always been a self-absorbed misogynist.

When Eliza plans to marry Freddy Eynsford-Hill, Higgins realizes that he loves her, but can't bring himself to confess his true feelings to her. The musical ends on an ambiguous note, suggesting a possible reconciliation between Higgins and Eliza.

My Fair Lady became a huge hit, one of Broadway's most famous and popular musicals. It was written by the legendary team of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Lowe.

The original cast featured Rex Harrison as Professor Higgins, and a young, virtually unknown British actress named Julie Andrews as Eliza. The Original Cast Recording became the best selling album of 1957 and 1958.

George Bernard Shaw died in 1950; he never lived to see the Broadway musical adaptation of his play, Pygmalion. If he had, there wouldn't have been a musical for him to see.

In 1908, Shaw's classic play The Chocolate Soldier was adapted as an operetta, and he hated it so much that he vowed that none of his plays would ever be set to music again. He kept that vow for the rest of his life.

In 1964, eight years after the musical debuted on Broadway, My Fair Lady was adapted as a feature film, directed by George Cukor.

Rex Harrison reprised his role as Professor Higgins, but producer and studio boss Jack Warner decided to cast Audrey Hepburn as Eliza Dolittle instead of Julie Andrews.

This decision angered fans of the musical, but Warner was concerned that casting Andrews would be risky because she had no film experience. Then he found that Audrey Hepburn couldn't sing, so her vocals had to be dubbed by Marni Nixon.

But Julie Andrews got the last laugh - she gave an Oscar winning performance in the classic Disney movie musical Mary Poppins - beating Hepburn for the Academy Award!

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"All great truths begin as blasphemies." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features the original theatrical trailer for the 1964 feature film adaptation of My Fair Lady. Enjoy!

Notes For October 28th, 2016

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On October 28th, 1905, Mrs. Warren's Profession, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Garrick Theater in New York. The play, Shaw's second, was written in 1893.

Banned in Britain by the Lord Chamberlain (England's theater censor) because of its frank depiction of prostitution, the play would finally open in London on January 5th, 1902, behind closed doors at the New Lyric Club - a private, members-only organization.

Private theatrical clubs were exempt from the censorship laws regulating public theaters in England. The play couldn't be legally performed in a British public theater until 1926, when theatrical censorship was less strict.

Mrs. Warren's Profession centers on the relationship between Mrs. Warren, a middle-aged ex-prostitute turned brothel madam, and her prudish, conservative, Cambridge-educated daughter, Vivie.

Mrs. Warren has always hidden the truth about her profession from her daughter. When Vivie discovers that her mother's fortune was really made in the brothel business, she's horrified.

Eventually, the two strong willed women reconcile when Mrs. Warren explains that her childhood, spent in grinding poverty and despair, led her to become a prostitute because it was the only way to support herself. Vivie forgives her - until she finds out that Mom is still running brothels.

Though the play was inspired by Yvette, a novel by the legendary French writer Guy de Maupassant, George Bernard Shaw, a staunch socialist, said that he wrote Mrs. Warren's Profession for this reason:

To draw attention to the truth that prostitution is caused not by female depravity and male licentiousness but simply by underpaying, undervaluing, and overworking women so shamefully that the poorest of them are forced to resort to prostitution to keep body and soul together.

After opening in New York, Mrs. Warren's Profession would close after only one performance, as the play was promptly shut down by puritanical authorities.

A few days later, on October 31st, the producer and the entire cast of actors were arrested for obscenity. Fortunately, they were all acquitted of the charge in court - including George Bernard Shaw, who was tried in absentia.

Shaw would go on to write many more classic plays, including Candida (1894), Caesar And Cleopatra (1898), Major Barbara (1905), The Doctor's Dilemma (1906), Fanny's First Play (1911), and Pygmalion (1912), upon which the famous, award-winning musical My Fair Lady was based.

In all of his works, Shaw extolled the virtues of socialism and denounced all forms of capitalist exploitation, including the degradation of women. He also drew attention to the effects of poverty, violence, and war on both society and the individual.

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"The secret of success is to offend the greatest number of people." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features a complete live performance of Mrs. Warren's Profession. Enjoy!

Notes For April 21st, 2016

---

This Day In Literary History

---

On April 21st, 1894, Arms and the Man, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Playhouse Theatre in London.

Arms and the Man (the title comes from the opening words of Virgil's Aeneid) was set during the 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian War. The play's heroine is a Bulgarian girl, Raina Petkoff. Her fiance is Sergius Saranoff, a war hero whom she idolizes.

One night, Captain Bluntschli, a Swiss mercenary soldier in the Serbian army, bursts in through Raina's bedroom window. After threatening her, Bluntschli begs Raina to hide him.

She complies, though she thinks he's a coward - especially when he tells her that he is armed with chocolates instead of bullets. After the battle dies down, Raina and her mother sneak Bluntschli out of the house, disguising him in a housecoat.

The war ends and Sergius returns to Raina - and flirts with her servant girl Louka. Raina finds the man she once idolized to be tiresome and foolhardy. Then, Bluntschli unexpectedly returns to give Raina back the housecoat.

Raina comes to realize that Bluntschli respects her as a woman, where Sergius does not. She tells Bluntschli that she left a picture of herself in a pocket of the housecoat for him, with the inscription "To my chocolate-cream soldier." Unfortunately, Bluntschli never found it.

Later, Bluntschli receives word that his father has died and he has inherited considerable wealth. Louka then tells Sergius that Bluntschli was the man whom Raina protected - and is in love with.

Sergius challenges Bluntschli to a duel, but the men avoid fighting when Sergius and Raina break off their engagement amicably. To Raina's father's horror, Sergius proposes to Louka.

Meanwhile, Bluntschli is now a wealthy businessman. Raina, recognizing the shallowness of her romantic ideals and her ex-fiance's values, tells him that she would rather have her poor chocolate-cream soldier instead.

He convinces her that he's still the same person. The play ends with Raina proclaiming her love for Bluntschli, who then proclaims to everyone that he will marry Raina when he returns in two weeks.

The opening performance of Arms and the Man received a standing ovation - and loud boos from one lone heckler, to whom the playwright quipped, "My dear fellow, I quite agree with you, but what are we two against so many?"

When a group of Bulgarian students complained about Shaw using their country's military history as a vehicle for satirizing the absurdities of war, the playwright made the following apology:

I greatly regret that my play, Arms and the Man, has wounded the susceptibilities of Bulgarian students in Berlin and Vienna. But I ask them to remember that it is the business of the writer of comedy to wound the susceptibilities of his audience. When the Bulgarian students, with my friendly assistance, have developed a sense of humor, there will be no more trouble.

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"Censorship ends in logical completeness when nobody is allowed to read any books except the books that nobody reads." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video a complete performance of George Bernard Shaw's classic play, Arms and the Man, taped live in London. Enjoy!

Notes For March 15th, 2016

---

This Day In Writing History

---

On March 15th, 1956, My Fair Lady, the acclaimed hit musical based on the classic play Pygmalion by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened on Broadway.

It premiered at the Mark Hellinger Theatre in New York City. The production then moved to the Broadhurst Theatre, and finally, to the Broadway Theatre, where it closed in 1962 after 2,717 performances.

Set in Edwardian London, My Fair Lady told the story of Henry Higgins, a professor of phonetics who meets a young flower seller named Eliza Dolittle when she tells off a young man named Freddy Eynsford-Hill for spilling her violets.

The ill-mannered Eliza speaks with an ear-torturing Cockney accent, her words filled with slang expressions and colloquialisms.

Professor Higgins makes a wager with his linguist friend Colonel Pickering, betting that Eliza could be taught to speak and act like a proper lady, after which, he will introduce her at the Embassy Ball. Pickering doesn't believe that Higgins can make a lady out of such a vulgar girl.

Eliza moves into Higgins' house and begins taking lessons from him. Her father soon pays a visit, concerned that the Professor is compromising her virtue. Higgins buys him off with five pounds.

As Eliza's lessons progress, she grows frustrated and fantasizes about killing Higgins. But soon, the flower seller begins to bloom.

Eliza's first public presentation, at the Ascot Racecourse, proves successful, but then she suffers a relapse, returning to her Cockney vulgarity. This charms Freddy Eynsford-Hill, the young man she had met and scolded earlier. He falls in love with her.

Higgins continues with Eliza's lessons. She faces her final test at the Embassy Ball and passes with flying colors. Afterward, Colonel Pickering praises Higgins for his triumph in making a lady out of Eliza.

When she learns of their bet, she feels that Higgins used her and is now abandoning her. Their relationship ends in a huff when Higgins insults Eliza and she storms off. Soon, even Colonel Pickering becomes annoyed with Higgins, who has always been a self-absorbed misogynist.

When Eliza plans to marry Freddy Eynsford-Hill, Higgins realizes that he loves her, but can't bring himself to confess his true feelings to her. The musical ends on an ambiguous note, suggesting a possible reconciliation between Higgins and Eliza.

My Fair Lady became a huge hit, one of Broadway's most famous and popular musicals. It was written by the legendary team of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Lowe.

The original cast featured Rex Harrison as Professor Higgins, and a young, virtually unknown British actress named Julie Andrews as Eliza. The Original Cast Recording became the best selling album of 1957 and 1958.

George Bernard Shaw died in 1950; he never lived to see the Broadway musical adaptation of his play, Pygmalion. If he had, there wouldn't have been a musical for him to see.

In 1908, Shaw's classic play The Chocolate Soldier was adapted as an operetta, and he hated it so much that he vowed that none of his plays would ever be set to music again. He kept that vow for the rest of his life.

In 1964, eight years after the musical debuted on Broadway, My Fair Lady was adapted as a feature film, directed by George Cukor.

Rex Harrison reprised his role as Professor Higgins, but producer and studio boss Jack Warner decided to cast Audrey Hepburn as Eliza Dolittle instead of Julie Andrews.

This decision angered fans of the musical, but Warner was concerned that casting Andrews would be risky because she had no film experience. Then he found that Audrey Hepburn couldn't sing, so her vocals had to be dubbed by Marni Nixon.

To make matters worse, that same year, Julie Andrews gave an Oscar winning performance in the classic Disney movie musical Mary Poppins - beating Hepburn for the Academy Award!

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"All great truths begin as blasphemies." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features the original theatrical trailer for the 1964 feature film adaptation of My Fair Lady. Enjoy!

Notes For October 28th, 2015

---

This Day In Writing History

---

On October 28th, 1905, Mrs. Warren's Profession, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Garrick Theater in New York. The play, Shaw's second, was written in 1893.

Banned in Britain by the Lord Chamberlain (England's theater censor) because of its frank depiction of prostitution, the play would finally open in London on January 5th, 1902, behind closed doors at the New Lyric Club - a private, members-only organization.

Private theatrical clubs were exempt from the censorship laws regulating public theaters in England. The play couldn't be legally performed in a British public theater until 1926, when theatrical censorship was less strict.

Mrs. Warren's Profession centers on the relationship between Mrs. Warren, a middle-aged ex-prostitute turned brothel madam, and her prudish, conservative, Cambridge-educated daughter, Vivie.

Mrs. Warren has always hidden the truth about her profession from her daughter. When Vivie discovers that her mother's fortune was really made in the brothel business, she's horrified.

Eventually, the two strong willed women reconcile when Mrs. Warren explains that her childhood, spent in grinding poverty and despair, led her to become a prostitute because it was the only way to support herself. Vivie forgives her - until she finds out that Mom is still running brothels.

Though the play was inspired by Yvette, a novel by the legendary French writer Guy de Maupassant, George Bernard Shaw, a staunch socialist, said that he wrote Mrs. Warren's Profession for this reason:

To draw attention to the truth that prostitution is caused not by female depravity and male licentiousness but simply by underpaying, undervaluing, and overworking women so shamefully that the poorest of them are forced to resort to prostitution to keep body and soul together.

After opening in New York, Mrs. Warren's Profession would close after only one performance, as the play was promptly shut down by puritanical authorities.

A few days later, on October 31st, the producer and the entire cast of actors were arrested for obscenity. Fortunately, they were all acquitted of the charge in court - including George Bernard Shaw, who was tried in absentia.

Shaw would go on to write many more classic plays, including Candida (1894), Caesar And Cleopatra (1898), Major Barbara (1905), The Doctor's Dilemma (1906), Fanny's First Play (1911), and Pygmalion (1912), upon which the famous, award-winning musical My Fair Lady was based.

In all of his works, Shaw extolled the virtues of socialism and denounced all forms of capitalist exploitation, including the degradation of women. He also drew attention to the effects of poverty, violence, and war on both society and the individual.

---

Quote Of The Day

---

"The secret of success is to offend the greatest number of people." - George Bernard Shaw

---

Vanguard Video

---

Today's video features a complete live performance of Mrs. Warren's Profession. Enjoy!

Notes For April 21st, 2015

---

This Day In Writing History

---

On April 21st, 1894, Arms and the Man, the classic play by the legendary Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, opened at the Playhouse Theatre in London.

Arms and the Man (the title comes from the opening words of Virgil's Aeneid) was set during the 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian War. The play's heroine is a Bulgarian girl, Raina Petkoff. Her fiance is Sergius Saranoff, a war hero whom she idolizes.

One night, Captain Bluntschli, a Swiss mercenary soldier in the Serbian army, bursts in through Raina's bedroom window. After threatening her, Bluntschli begs Raina to hide him.

She complies, though she thinks he's a coward - especially when he tells her that he is armed with chocolates instead of bullets. After the battle dies down, Raina and her mother sneak Bluntschli out of the house, disguising him in a housecoat.

The war ends and Sergius returns to Raina - and flirts with her servant girl Louka. Raina finds the man she once idolized to be tiresome and foolhardy. Then, Bluntschli unexpectedly returns to give Raina back the housecoat.

Raina comes to realize that Bluntschli respects her as a woman, where Sergius does not. She tells Bluntschli that she left a picture of herself in a pocket of the housecoat for him, with the inscription "To my chocolate-cream soldier." Unfortunately, Bluntschli never found it.

Later, Bluntschli receives word that his father has died and he has inherited considerable wealth. Louka then tells Sergius that Bluntschli was the man whom Raina protected - and is in love with.

Sergius challenges Bluntschli to a duel, but the men avoid fighting when Sergius and Raina break off their engagement amicably. To Raina's father's horror, Sergius proposes to Louka.

Meanwhile, Bluntschli is now a wealthy businessman. Raina, recognizing the shallowness of her romantic ideals and her ex-fiance's values, tells him that she would rather have her poor chocolate-cream soldier instead.

He convinces her that he's still the same person. The play ends with Raina proclaiming her love for Bluntschli, who then proclaims to everyone that he will marry Raina when he returns in two weeks.

The opening performance of Arms and the Man received a standing ovation - and loud boos from one lone heckler, to whom the playwright quipped, "My dear fellow, I quite agree with you, but what are we two against so many?"

When a group of Bulgarian students complained about Shaw using their country's military history as a vehicle for satirizing the absurdities of war, the playwright made the following apology:

I greatly regret that my play, Arms and the Man, has wounded the susceptibilities of Bulgarian students in Berlin and Vienna. But I ask them to remember that it is the business of the writer of comedy to wound the susceptibilities of his audience. When the Bulgarian students, with my friendly assistance, have developed a sense of humor, there will be no more trouble.

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Quote Of The Day

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"Censorship ends in logical completeness when nobody is allowed to read any books except the books that nobody reads." - George Bernard Shaw

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Vanguard Video

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Today's video a complete performance of George Bernard Shaw's classic play, Arms and the Man, taped live in London. Enjoy!