Dr. Sayyed Rahim Moosavinia, Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz
Mina Etemadnejad, MA in English literature, Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz
Abstract
As a prominent work of dramatic literature, George Bernard Shaw’s Major Barbara tackles the issue of poverty as seen by two opposing systems of thought, characterized in Major Barbara and Andrew Undershaft. While Barbara believes that poverty may be uprooted through charity centers such as The Salvation Army to which she belongs, Undershaft argues that it is through economic cycles and productions, even in their cruelest form such as ammunition factory, that jobs are created and as a result poverty is obliterated. These two conflicting ideas suggest that Barbara and Undershaft are products of two conflicting ideological systems and it is the clash of these two systems that moves the play ahead. Such a clash is enough to make the play the target of Althusserian approach. Louis Althusser argues that the capitalist societies establish and keep going different ideologies in an attempt to preserve the economic coalition of the state. According to Althusser, these ideologies are disseminated through such institutes as family, school, culture, literature, sports, and political parties. In his well-known term, Althusser calls these institutes Ideological State Apparatuses (ISAs). Ultimately, Althusser famously argues that while these ISAs infuse people with a false understanding of their existence, while a typical Marxian analysis gives them a true description of their place in capitalist societies. Althusser calls the former ideological discourse and the latter scientific discourse. To identify and discuss these two discourses in Bernard Shaw’s Major Barbara, the present research will focus on three ISAs including family ISA, cultural ISA, and political ISA, and will explore which character is the voice of the scientific discourse in the conflict of the play.
Key terms: “Louis Althusser,” “George Bernard Shaw,” “Ideological State Apparatuses,” “Scientific Discourse,” “Ideological Discourse”
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Introduction
Making such various notions as gender, marriage, life force, war, and socialism at the center of his satire, George Bernard Shaw is nowadays credited with founding the “theater of ideas” which explore, question, and undermine such matters as gender equality, gender discrimination, socioeconomic problems, the effects of poverty, philosophical notions, as well as war and heroism. One of the features of Shaw’s satire appears in the way he shatters illusory ideas and presents them in a realistic way. Considering the fact that such issues as war, gender discrimination, gender equality, and socioeconomic are politically tainted subjects that are softened by state-disseminated ideologies, Bernard Shaw’s plays can be studied in the light of Althusserian approach. Althusser contends that in capitalist societies, Ideological State Apparatuses (ISAs) are at work to uphold and publicize the interests of the dominant rulers. Thus, there are two dominant discourses at work: ideological and scientific. Althusser proceeds to state that while scientific discourses try to provide us with a true understanding of our existence, the ideological ones try to avoid it. Therefore, one of the missions of ideologies is to implement “false consciousness” in subjects’ minds (Ferretter, 2006, p. 76). In many of Shaw’s plays, we can see interpellated individuals whose minds are filled with ideological discourses and they propagate them all through the plays. On the other hand, there are characters who can be considered as the representatives of scientific discourses and become means by which the interpellated individuals can come to a real understanding of their existence. However, at the end of these kinds of plays, idealism (as created by ideologies) is shattered and realism (or, in Althusserian term, scientific discourse) comes to the fore (Evans, 2003).
A noteworthy example of this argument is Shaw’s Major Barbara. In this play, the audience sees the conversion of an idealistic young lady, Barbara Undershaft, who comes to see her surrounding in a more accurate way. In this work, Barbara is active in helping the poor as an authorized (a Major) in the Salvation Army in a district of London. For a long time, Barbara and her family have been apart from Andrew Undershaft, their father, who now reunites as a rich and successful munitions manufacturer. Undershaft, the father, donates money to the Army, which upsets Major Barbara, who is not interested to be associated with his “tainted” fortune. Yet, the father becomes an agent of scientific discourse and argues that poverty is a worse and eviler problem than munitions, and believes that he is doing more to contribute to society by giving his workers jobs and a stable income than what Major Barbara is doing to help them by providing them with bread and soup.
As the synopsis tells us, the play is here concerned with such issues as poverty, war, and employment. These ideas are again dealt with in both idealistic and realistic terms and at the end the idealistic aspects are displaced by scientific discourses. With this background in mind, this article is going to examine Major Barbara in the light of Althusserian “scientific” and “ideological” discourses to show how Shaw subverts key ideas in his attempt to satirize social misunderstandings.
Capital and Human Relationships
As a Marxist philosopher, Althusser maintains that human relationship is highly determined by capital and one of missions of ISAs is to preserve class coalition. Such a relationship is clearly seen in Major Barbara. In fact in this play, it is capital which brings power to its owner and makes him or her center. . In the opening scene of the play, we see Lady Britomart convincing her son, Stephen, to invite his long absent father to their home. She is completely aware that Stephen and her sisters are certainly against this meeting. Due to the father’s long-standing absence, the biological and familial bond between the children and their father is seriously damaged and both sides do not show any signs of interest in meeting each other. But, for Lady Britomart, because of financial necessity and dependency, economic issues win over biological ones:
LADY BRITOMART. My dear Stephen: where is the money to come from? It is easy enough for you and the other children to live on my income as long as we are in the same house; but I can’t keep four families in four separate houses. You know how poor my father is: he has barely seven thousand a year now; and really, if he were not the Earl of Stevenage, he would have to give up society. He can do nothing for us.
Here it is clear that Lady Britomart wants to see her former husband again just because of economic necessity. In her explanation to Stephen, all relationships are economically defined: relationships between parents and children, grandfather and grandchildren, mother-in-law and son-in-law, with the description of “naturally enough.” Even, Lady Britomart has attempted to arrange her daughters’ marriages based on economic power of their suitors. In a part of her dialogues with Stephen, she “complacently” states: “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” (9). It seems, due to Lomax’s economic future, Lady Britomart is satisfied with Sarah’s future husband. But, in contrast, she appears to be dissatisfied with Barbara’s future husband because of the couple’s uncertain financial states:
LADY BRITOMART. I thought Barbara was going to make the most brilliant career of all of you. And what does she do? Joins the Salvation Army; discharges her maid; lives on a pound a week; and walks in one evening with a professor of Greek whom she has picked up in the street, and who pretends to be a Salvationist, and actually plays the big drum for her in public because he has fallen head over ears in love with her. (9)
Here, Lady Britomart shows her preference for capital over love as a romantic issue. As a former woman of a capitalist and as a present daughter of an Earl, she believes that it is class and economic hierarchy that are finally at work in human relationships, not such issues as familial bonds or love. For her, even philanthropic and honorable activities and decisions such as membership in Salvation Army or being a wife of a moneyless university professor, what her daughter Barbara does, are much less important than finding a true economic source. Thus, regardless of her children’s reluctance to meet their father, she invites Andrew to their home, indicating that her decisions and arrangements are financially set.
As a voice of scientific discourse in the play, Lady Britomart has agreed to take that her family is financially depended on Andrew Undershaft. Therefore, her discussion with Stephen is not for determining whether they should take money from Andrew or not: “the money is settled … it is not a question of taking money from him or not: it is simply a question of how much” (20). As a conscious character about herself and her family’s existence, she knows that Andrew is a capitalist and they have to resort to his financial power, a fact resisted by her children. When confronted by this scientific discourse, one of her children, Stephen, “bitterly” states that “We are utterly dependent on him and his cannons, then!” (20).
Lady Britomart as an Ideological Presence
In Althusserian philosophy, the family ISA is one of the ISAs aiming at fostering obedient children and preparing them for social arena. According to Althusser, hierarchy and ideologies of the dominant class is mostly transmitted to children in such private and domestic settings as families and schools. In such institutions, Althusser argues, children learn how to behave in line with norms and internalize ideologies of the state. Remarkably, similar to other ISAs, the family ISA exerts its power not through force, but through creating consent in its subjects.
In Bernard Shaw’s Major Barbara, the existence of the family ISA is clearly seen from the very opening. As the play begins, the audience witnesses the confrontation of a mother and a son, Lady Britomart and Stephen, and how they discuss an issue, reunion with the children’s father. Lady Britomart is the apparent financial provider of the family and thus she is naturally the representative of family ISA in the house. This role on her shoulders causes a kind of awe and obedience in her children. When she and her son want to come together, Shaw describes her son in this way: “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” (5). According to Shaw’s description, Stephen’s “awe” is not a sign of “any weakness” in his character, but a sign of his presence under the supervision of the family ISA, a presence “from childish” days. Thus, when he enters to respond to his mother’s call, he faces his mother’s instructions on how to behave
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. (5)
As this excerpt indicates, Lady Britomart holds power in her dealings with her son. She holds power because she is the economic source of the family and it is she who plays the role of the family ISA at their home as a private institution. All such roles let her mold the character of her children, and even her sons-in-law, in agreement with the needs of society. As an instance, in a very important dialogue, Lady Britomart advises her son to make himself ready for his participation in society: “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” (7). This advice for “responsibility” leads in fact to the one as enforced by society.
As went before, at the beginning of the play, Lady Britomart’s attempts to advise her children are about reconciliation with and respect for their father who is a prominent capitalist in Europe and who is the financial provider of her household. In other words, in Althusserian term, her role as the family ISA is in preparing her children to respect and uphold the economic hierarchy of both private and public institutions. After a long discussion, Lady Britomart seems to be finally successful in making her son understand this economic hierarchy. In an attempt to get Stephen’s confirmation, she says: “Now don’t tease, Stephen. Come! you see that it is necessary that he should pay us a visit, don’t you?” (21). Stephen, who is now exposed to the scientific discourse and is now aware of the economic order, answers “I suppose so, if the girls cannot do without his money” (21). What is noteworthy in her dealings with Stephen is that, in common with other ISAs, she exerts her power not through force, but through the consent of her subject. This issue is clearly seen in her speech with Stephen: “You know I have never treated any of you as children. I have always made you my companions and friends, and allowed you perfect freedom to do and say whatever you liked, so long as you liked what I could approve of” (15).
As the family ISA, Lady Britomart is highly observant of her family’s conduct and directly or indirectly reminds them of their misbehavior. For example, when she is dissatisfied with the remarks of Sarah’s fiancé, she turns to Barbara’s husband and says: “Adolphus: you are a professor of Greek. Can you translate Charles Lomax’s remarks into reputable English for us?” (27). While in this instance she indirectly mentions Charles Lomax’s misconduct, there are other instances she directly reminds others of their misbehavior: “I will not be disobeyed by everybody. Adolphus: sit down. Charles: you may go. You are not fit for prayers: you cannot keep your countenance” (46). Remarkably, Lady Britomart’s comments do not disconcert the men, since they regard her as the family ISA because of her economic axis. When Lady Britomart asks Cusins to remind her of what she was talking about, he answers her in a way he is completely aware of her ISA role: “You were saying that as Mr Undershaft has not seen his children since they were babies, he will form his opinion of the way you have brought them up from their behavior to-night, and that therefore you wish us all to be particularly careful to conduct ourselves well, especially Charles” (29).
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Whigs and Tories as the Political ISA
According to Althusser, membership to political parties brings a sense of belonging to citizens. In fact, such parties are aimed at creating consent through such belongings. Possibly, the most important ISA in Bernard Shaw’s Major Barbara is the political ISA. Though political parties are rarely mentioned in the play directly, we can see the thoughts coming out of political tendencies. What is apparent in the play is the fact that Barbara’s ideas are in sharp contrast to those of her father, Andrew. In fact, when it comes to the confrontation between their ideas, we see two opposing ideological discourses at work. As Fredric Berg in his Structure and philosophy in Man and Superman and Major Barbara points out,
“the basic structure of the play is triangular: Barbara Undershaft, the Salvation Army lass who is a true believer in her ability to do good in ‘the world as it is’; her fiancé, Adolphus Cusins, torn between love, religion, and classical thought as the means to serve mankind and hence not quite committing to any; and her father, Andrew Undershaft, who, whatever we may think of it, has a functional philosophy for dealing with the realities of this world, where poverty is ‘the worst of crimes’” (155).
Berg’s statement means that the audience watch a play in which the story moves ahead as a result of clash of contradictory discourses. This is also acknowledged by Bernard Shaw himself when he calls his Major Barbara “an ethical discussion in three long acts” (qtd. in Dukore, 1999, p. 200). As pointed out before, in the opening pages of the play, Lady Britomart states that “my family, thank Heaven, is not a pig-headed Tory one. We are Whigs, and believe in liberty” (10). This statement is a good clue for viewers and readers to know that Lady Britomart and her children belong to a political ISA which claims for liberty and freedom in all aspects. By putting Whigs in opposition to Tory and deciding on her membership, Lady Britomart foreshadows Barbara’s system of thought. As is generally known, the Whigs, which are now the Liberal Democrats, were a political party contesting power with their rivals, the Tories, which are now the Conservative Party. The Whigs’ origin lay in constitutional monarchism and opposition to absolute monarchy (Thackeray & Findling, 2012). Thus Britomart’s membership naturally signifies revolutionary and idealistic ideas existing in both herself and in her daughter. Thus, the main thrust of discussion in Major Barbara is the clash between Barbara’s idealistic and Andrew’s realistic thoughts about such issues as benevolence and poverty. This is clearly seen in their first encounter:
UNDERSHAFT. May I ask have you ever saved a maker of cannons?
BARBARA. No. Will you let me try?
UNDERSHAFT. Well, I will make a bargain with you. If I go to see you to-morrow in your Salvation Shelter, will you come the day after to see me in my cannon works?
BARBARA. Take care. It may end in your giving up the cannons for the sake of the Salvation Army.
UNDERSHAFT. Are you sure it will not end in your giving up the Salvation Army for the sake of the cannons?
BARBARA. I will take my chance of that. (43)
This dialogue clearly shows that Barbara and her father belong to two different ideological discourses. While Undershaft belongs to the political party which favors war, Barbara belongs to the one which is antiwar. According to Stuart E. Baker, “the parable opposes two sets of seemingly irreconcilable principles, polar opposites that must be eternally at war: spirit against matter, religion against atheism, altruism versus egoism, heroic idealism opposed to cynical pragmatism” (1999, p.91). Here, Barbara and Undershaft aim at changing each other’s system of thought and interpellating the other party into his or her ideological discourse. The successful side is in fact the play’s favored discourse. In Althusserian term, the winner of this bet between the two is Bernard Shaw’s version of scientific discourse in the play.
The second act of the play opens in the Salvation Army. Here, the play reveals some aspects of the discourse to which Barbara belongs. In this act, we see the true motives of the seemingly needed people who have found a resort in the Army. By showing what goes on behind, Bernard Shaw shows us the real situation to which Barbara is interpellated. In the opening of the second act, we see a man and a woman discussing the Army and their presence there. In the stage direction, the man is described in this way: “The man, a workman out of employment, is young, agile, a talker, a poser, sharp enough to be capable of anything in reason except honesty or altruistic considerations of any kind” (50). Through this description, soon the play foreshadows the scientific discourse it tries to communicate.
While the interpellated Barbara strongly believes that members of the Salvation Army have clung to this ideology out of honesty and altruism, Shaw directly informs his readers that the man is there not out of compassion, but out of “employment.” In addition, the man himself acknowledges his opportunism by saying “in Rome, so to speak, I do as the Romans do” (52). Another indication of the opportunism of the members are revealed when the man and woman talk about the Army:
PRICE. Wot! Oh Rummy, Rummy! Respectable married woman, Rummy, gittin rescued by the Salvation Army by pretendin to be a bad un. Same old game!
RUMMY. What am I to do? I can’t starve. Them Salvation lasses is dear good girls; but the better you are, the worse they likes to think you were before they rescued you. Why shouldn’t they av a bit o credit, poor loves? They’re worn to rags by their work. And where would they get the money to rescue us if we was to let on we’re no worse than other people? You know what ladies and gentlemen are. (54)
Rummy’s argument shows that these commoners who cannot even speak in standard English are aware of the business nature of the Salvation Army, while Barbara is deaf and blind to this fact. By exposing these dialogues, Shaw wants to show us the realistic side of events, or in Althusserian term, the scientific discourse. In addition to the woman, the man who is called Price confesses his presence in the Salvation Army. When Rummy asks him “Who saved you, Mr. Price? Was it Major Barbara?” (54), he answers:
PRICE. No: I come here on my own. I’m goin to be Bronterre O’Brien Price, the converted painter. I know wot they like. I’ll tell em how I blasphemed and gambled and wopped my poor old mother—
RUMMY [shocked] Used you to beat your mother?
PRICE. Not likely. She used to beat me. No matter: you come and listen to the converted painter, and you’ll hear how she was a pious woman that taught me me prayers at er knee, an how I used to come home drunk and drag her out o bed be er snow white airs, an lam into er with the poker. (55)
Rummy and Price’s statements show the fact that the Army is a place of shams and lies, and not a place for honesty and salvation. As Stuart E. Baker points out, Major Barbara is Shaw’s mature play in “presenting a reality both difficult to contemplate and worthy of respect” (1999, p. 87). In addition to depicting realities of the Salvation Army, Shaw puts the responsibility of expressing reality on the shoulder of Andrew. Though his job is repelling and disgusting and as a result he is rejected by others, he begins presenting other characters and audiences with scientific discourse:
UNDERSHAFT. I am rather interested in the Salvation Army. Its motto might be my own: Blood and Fire.
LOMAX [shocked] But not your sort of blood and fire, you know.
UNDERSHAFT. My sort of blood cleanses: my sort of fire purifies. (39)
Undershaft’s claim of the cleansing nature of his actions lies in the fact that his economic business is able to create job and capital for many. He, who was born and grew up in poverty, argues that a love of poverty (and thus the resultant dirt, disease, and suffering) is an unnatural tendency. He emphasizes that people like he himself, Cusins, and Barbara are “above the common people” (94), and therefore their faculties require them to have a responsibility to work together to promote the common people. Thus, in his views, “Barbara must belong to us, not to the Salvation Army” (94). Though Barbara seems to be a strongly interpellated character, Undershaft is optimist about her reception of the scientific discourse:
UNDERSHAFT. Keep to the point. We have to win her; and we are neither of us Methodists.
CUSINS. That doesn’t matter. The power Barbara wields here—the power that wields Barbara herself—is not Calvinism, not Presbyterianism, not Methodism—
UNDERSHAFT. Not Greek Paganism either, eh?
CUSINS. I admit that. Barbara is quite original in her religion.
UNDERSHAFT [triumphantly] Aha! Barbara Undershaft would be. Her inspiration comes from within herself.
CUSINS. How do you suppose it got there?
UNDERSHAFT [in towering excitement] It is the Undershaft inheritance. I shall hand on my torch to my daughter. She shall make my converts and preach my gospel.
CUSINS. What! Money and gunpowder!
UNDERSHAFT. Yes, money and gunpowder; freedom and power; command of life and command of death. (92)
As this excerpt indicates, Undershafts and Cusins enumerate the different religious and ethical ISAs to which Barbara may be possibly a part. But, they come to the conclusion that Barbara has got some sense of individuality in choosing her membership. Undershaft’s prediction about Barbara comes true at the end of the play. The first time she comes to see the scientific discourse is when she announces her protests that the Army cannot accept questionable or tainted money, after her father donates some money to the Army. After protesting she is barraged with a series of seductive arguments in favor of accepting the money, implying for her that the system to which she belongs is a business like institution which is solely after money. By seeing this situation, she quietly removes her badge of office and pins it on her father.
The second time Barbara is faced with realism is when she and her family arrive at the munitions village. By seeing Andrew’s system, they are all astonished to discover that it is a very good model of absolute perfection — it is tainted only by the fact that every person lives there with the understanding that they might “be blown to smithereens at any moment” (160). In his factory, Undershaft maintains that cannons are not responsible for killing people — it is the people themselves who fire them and who kill each other. After expressing his views, Undershaft invites Cusins to adopt the profession and then apply all his capital and power to make changes to human nature and to produce people of righteousness and daring and moral conviction. After this invitation, he leaves to provide an opportunity for Barbara and Cusins to decide whether to accept or reject the proposal. Finally, after seeing that they can use Andrew’s system to promote humanity, they decide on accepting the offer and Barbara sees in it that instead of changing people by giving them such basic necessities as food and shelter, she could now convert people who are in no immediate need of bodily necessities.
In fact, Barbara’s joining Undershaft’s system suggests the final victory of the scientific discourse Undershaft propagated. The victory of Undershaft—or at best the victory of Undershaft and Lazarus, Ltd., over the Salvation Army—can be understood as Gilbert Keith Chesterton saw it: “Major Barbara … contains a strong religious element; but when all is said, the whole point of the play is that the religious element is defeated” (190). In Althusserian term, this defeat is the defeat of political, religious, and ethical ISAs in the play. The real enemy in the play is the idealism that comes out of these ISAs, which leads to “the refusal to look hard truths in the eye” (Baker, 1999, p. 92). Finally, the concluding statement of the play is expressed by Undershaft when he quotes Plato’s paradox that “society cannot be saved until either the Professors of Greek take to making gunpowder, or else the makers of gunpowder become Professors of Greek” (188).
Conclusion
This research takes us to the conclusion that George Bernard Shaw’s Major Barbara is capable of being studied in the light of Althusserian philosophy. Due to its political orientation, Althusserian ideas of ISAs are clearly detectable in the play. Also, it should be remembered that since Shaw is a great satirist, there is a message in whatever he writes. Thus, we can naturally detect a kind of preference for a thesis or an idea in his plays. Major Barbara is a play in which the presence of capital is clearly felt. In this play, we can clearly see how human relationship is determined by issues of capital and class. The sources of economy are in fact the sources of power to which other characters resort to. The play contains two different and opposing ideas, one belonging to Major Barbara, the other to Andrew Undershaft. Both these characters are product and transmitter of a certain ideological discourse and in this play they come into a contact to see who is true in his or her idea. Again, the winner of this clash is the producer of scientific discourse in the play. The main target of Barbara and Undershaft’s discussion is the question of poverty. While the ISA to which Barbara belongs argues that poverty should be prevented by charity centers, the one to which Undershaft is a member holds that poverty is uprooted through economic cycle, even in its cruelest way such as working in ammunition factory. The fact that Undershaft succeeds in convincing Barbara indicates that it is Undershaft who becomes the representative of scientific discourse in the play and also the mouthpiece of Bernard Shaw.
Works Cited
Baker, S. E. (1999). “Major Barbara, the Organic and the Didactic” in George Bernard Shaw, ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House Publishers.
Bernard Shaw, G. (2009). Major Barbara. Portland: The Floating Press.
Dukore, B. F. (1971). Shaw’s Theater. Florida: University Press of Florida.
Evans, J. (2003). The Politics and Plays of Bernard Shaw. Jefferson, NC: McFarland.
Ferretter, L. (2006). Louis Althusser. London: Routledge.
Thackeray, F. W. Findling, J. E. (2012). Events That Formed the Modern World: From the European Renaissance to the War on Terror. Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO.
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