George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950), Irish dramatist, literary critic, a socialist spokesman, and a leading figure in the 20th century theater. Shaw was a freethinker, a supporter of women`s rights and an advocate of equality of income. In 1925 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. Shaw accepted the honor but refused the money. George Bernard Shaw was born on 26 July 1856, in Dublin, as the son of George Carr Shaw, who was in the wholesale grain trade, and Lucinda Elisabeth Shaw, the daughter of an impoverished landowner. Shaw`s childhood was troubled. His father was a drunkard, which made his son a teetotaler. Shaw went to the Wesleyan Connexional School, then moved to a private school near Dalkey, and then to Dublin`s Central Model School, ending his formal education at the Dublin English Scientific and Commercial Day School. At the age of 15 he started to work as a junior clerk. In 1876 he went to London, joining his sister and mother. Shaw did not return to Ireland for nearly thirty years.