3 Review(s)

George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) once quipped that it is "up to the author to take care of himself." This rich selection of Shaw's correspondence with his US and UK publishers proves how much the dramatist lived up to his own words by providing the details of his steady involvement in the publication of his works. Covering nearly sixty years of a very productive career, Bernard Shaw and His Publishers is a first-hand account of Shaw's efforts to control all aspects of his works. The letters reveal Shaw's thoughts on issues ranging from pricing, advertising, copyright, and royalties, to typeface, margin size, paper choice, binding, and colour. Complete with full annotations by Michel W. Pharand, this volume sheds new light on Shaw and his working habits, as well as on the history of early-twentieth-century publishing, and will appeal to Shaw scholars and theatre researchers, as well as book and print-culture historians.