



Produced by Eve Sobol.  HTML version by Al Haines.









MAJOR BARBARA

BERNARD SHAW




ACT I

It is after dinner on a January night, in the library in
Lady Britomart Undershaft's house in Wilton Crescent. A large and
comfortable settee is in the middle of the room, upholstered in
dark leather. A person sitting on it [it is vacant at present]
would have, on his right, Lady Britomart's writing table, with
the lady herself busy at it; a smaller writing table behind him
on his left; the door behind him on Lady Britomart's side; and a
window with a window seat directly on his left. Near the window
is an armchair.

Lady Britomart is a woman of fifty or thereabouts, well dressed
and yet careless of her dress, well bred and quite reckless of
her breeding, well mannered and yet appallingly outspoken and
indifferent to the opinion of her interlocutory, amiable and yet
peremptory, arbitrary, and high-tempered to the last bearable
degree, and withal a very typical managing matron of the upper
class, treated as a naughty child until she grew into a scolding
mother, and finally settling down with plenty of practical
ability and worldly experience, limited in the oddest way with
domestic and class limitations, conceiving the universe exactly
as if it were a large house in Wilton Crescent, though handling
her corner of it very effectively on that assumption, and being
quite enlightened and liberal as to the books in the library, the
pictures on the walls, the music in the portfolios, and the
articles in the papers.

Her son, Stephen, comes in. He is a gravely correct young man
under 25, taking himself very seriously, but still in some awe of
his mother, from childish habit and bachelor shyness rather than
from any weakness of character.

STEPHEN. What's the matter?

LADY BRITOMART. Presently, Stephen.

Stephen submissively walks to the settee and sits down. He takes
up The Speaker.

LADY BRITOMART. Don't begin to read, Stephen. I shall require all
your attention.

STEPHEN. It was only while I was waiting--

LADY BRITOMART. Don't make excuses, Stephen. [He puts down The
Speaker]. Now! [She finishes her writing; rises; and comes to the
settee]. I have not kept you waiting very long, I think.

STEPHEN. Not at all, mother.

LADY BRITOMART. Bring me my cushion. [He takes the cushion from
the chair at the desk and arranges it for her as she sits down on
the settee]. Sit down. [He sits down and fingers his tie
nervously]. Don't fiddle with your tie, Stephen: there is nothing
the matter with it.

STEPHEN. I beg your pardon. [He fiddles with his watch chain
instead].

LADY BRITOMART. Now are you attending to me, Stephen?

STEPHEN. Of course, mother.

LADY BRITOMART. No: it's not of course. I want something much
more than your everyday matter-of-course attention. I am going to
speak to you very seriously, Stephen. I wish you would let that
chain alone.

STEPHEN [hastily relinquishing the chain] Have I done anything to
annoy you, mother? If so, it was quite unintentional.

LADY BRITOMART [astonished] Nonsense! [With some remorse] My poor
boy, did you think I was angry with you?

STEPHEN. What is it, then, mother? You are making me very uneasy.

LADY BRITOMART [squaring herself at him rather aggressively]
Stephen: may I ask how soon you intend to realize that you are a
grown-up man, and that I am only a woman?

STEPHEN [amazed] Only a--

LADY BRITOMART. Don't repeat my words, please: It is a most
aggravating habit. You must learn to face life seriously,
Stephen. I really cannot bear the whole burden of our family
affairs any longer. You must advise me: you must assume the
responsibility.

STEPHEN. I!

LADY BRITOMART. Yes, you, of course. You were 24 last June.
You've been at Harrow and Cambridge. You've been to India and
Japan. You must know a lot of things now; unless you have wasted
your time most scandalously. Well, advise me.

STEPHEN [much perplexed] You know I have never interfered in the
household--

LADY BRITOMART. No: I should think not. I don't want you to order
the dinner.

STEPHEN. I mean in our family affairs.

LADY BRITOMART. Well, you must interfere now; for they are
getting quite beyond me.

STEPHEN [troubled] I have thought sometimes that perhaps I ought;
but really, mother, I know so little about them; and what I do
know is so painful--it is so impossible to mention some things to
you--[he stops, ashamed].

LADY BRITOMART. I suppose you mean your father.

STEPHEN [almost inaudibly] Yes.

LADY BRITOMART. My dear: we can't go on all our lives not
mentioning him. Of course you were quite right not to open the
subject until I asked you to; but you are old enough now to be
taken into my confidence, and to help me to deal with him about
the girls.

STEPHEN. But the girls are all right. They are engaged.

LADY BRITOMART [complacently] Yes: I have made a very good match
for Sarah. Charles Lomax will be a millionaire at 35. But that is
ten years ahead; and in the meantime his trustees cannot under
the terms of his father's will allow him more than 800 pounds a
year.

STEPHEN. But the will says also that if he increases his income
by his own exertions, they may double the increase.

LADY BR