Research Specifications

Abstract: The present study focuses on the concept of superman proposed by Wagner, Nietzsche and George Bernard Shaw, the way Shaw was affected by these two geniuses’ notion of superman, especially by Nietzsche, and transformed it to the mind of English-speaking audiences. Midway through the modern era, with the advent of Industrialism and later on with the expansion of Imperialism, the democratic system of the time, the upper class, brutally exploited workers and made them live in an abject poverty. In this respect, Shaw believed that this deficiency would eventually be corrected by the emergence of a long-lived superman with intelligence and experience to govern properly. Therefore, in this study the interplay between Wagnerian, Nietzschian, and their impact on Shavian notion of superman will be discussed. Bernard Shaw’s works, Pygmalion, Major Barbara, and Saint Joan, will be analyzed to find out how he applies instrumentally Nietschian notion of superman to create his own ideal superman. Shaw’s major characters: Henry Higgins in Pygmalion, Andrew Undershaft in Major Barbra, and the male world in Saint Joan represent Nietzschian idea of superman, and they stand for Capitalism, evil force in society; while the plays’ female characters: Eliza Doolittle, Barbara, and Saint Joan, are the representative of goodness, Socialism, and Shavian concept of superman. Finally, as an ultimate goal, it will be explained and expounded that Shaw’s Saint Joan can stand as an absolute embodiment of Shavian Superman; the one who will be killed because the world is not ready for her, and because power is in the hand of fools who corrupt it.