George Bernard Shaw

Born in Dublin, George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) began his writing career as a theater and classical music critic, and is still regarded as one of the best ever practitioners of the latter. He found success on the stage with his 1894 play Arms and the Man. Despite using his plays to air many of his controversial views (pro-communism, pro-eugenics, anti-vaccination, anti-World War I), his didactic works were received rapturously in British theater. He became the first person to win both a Nobel Prize (for Literature) and an Oscar (for his script for the film version of Pygmalion).