3 h 58 minAudiobook9 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at cost
Audiobook edition · 3 h 58 minPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if the money that gives you independence comes from choices you cannot accept?
Vivie Warren wants useful work, honest dealings, and a living she earns herself. Then she discovers that her mother, Mrs. Warren, builds her comfortable life on the business of prostitution. In Bernard Shaw’s play, a family confrontation becomes a struggle over what a daughter owes her mother—and herself.
Mrs. Warren defends her choices by describing the exhausting labour and miserable pay available to poor women. But understanding those pressures does not settle Vivie’s questions. Around them, wealthy business partner Sir George Crofts and charming, dependent Frank Gardner bring money, marriage, and respectability into a debate where affection offers no easy answers.
What you’ll discover
- An independent young woman Meet Vivie, whose commitment to work tests the claims of family, comfort, and romance.
- A mother's forceful defence Hear Mrs. Warren explain the narrow choices that make survival a question of money.
- The cost of respectability See how Sir George Crofts connects a respectable social position with profits from prostitution.
- Conversation with sharp edges Follow confrontations where offers of affection and security become tests of what Vivie will tolerate.
- Understanding without easy acceptance Explore the uneasy distance between recognising another person’s hardship and accepting the choices they make.
Who will love it
You will love this if you enjoy sharp talk on the stage, family secrets, strong women who say what they think, and plays that ask what money and respectability really cost.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A modern daughter waits in a cottage garden
- Mrs Warren and her friends come down from London
- At night the cottage fills with schemes
- A daughter demands the truth from her mother
- Mrs Warren tells how she began
- Shame is only good manners
- Hypocrisy runs through every respectable character
- Money and class decide who gets a choice
- A problem play that refuses the usual stage logic
Who’s who
- Vivie WarrenA clever, practical young woman who has just excelled at Cambridge and wants to build a career in law and finance on her own terms.
- Mrs WarrenVivie's loud, warm and shrewd mother, who wants her daughter's respect and company and is proud of the life she built from poverty.
- Sir George CroftsA wealthy baronet and old business partner of Mrs Warren, who sees Vivie as a prize to be won and thinks well of himself.
- PraedA gentle, romantic architect and old friend of Mrs Warren, who believes in art and beauty and wants everyone to be kind.
- Frank GardnerA charming, idle and penniless young man who wants to marry Vivie and takes nothing seriously.
- The Reverend Samuel GardnerFrank's father, a pompous clergyman who wants a respectable position and fears that his youthful past may catch up with him.
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Mrs. Warren's Profession
by Bernard Shaw · 1898
In a Surrey cottage at night, a Cambridge mathematician learns what funded her studies, but her mother won't apologise.
Medium level2–5 hours to readEspañol
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In short
What do you do when you learn that the comfort of your whole life was bought with money you never asked about? That is the question Vivie Warren, a brilliant young Cambridge mathematician, faces in Mrs Warren's Profession.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A modern daughter waits in a cottage garden
The play opens at a cottage in Surrey on a summer afternoon. Vivie Warren, aged twenty-two, lies in a hammock with a pile of serious books beside her. She has tied for third wrangler at Cambridge, though she calls it poorly paid work rather than a triumph.
A gentleman called Praed arrives. He is an architect who calls himself an artist and an anarchist, and he expects a delicate young lady. Vivie shakes his hand so firmly that he flexes his fingers afterward. She says she did her mathematics for money. She plans an office in the City, doing actuarial work and some legal work too. She likes a cigar, a little whisky and a detective story.
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- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas of the whole book in about 9 minutes. A good first look, or a refresher.
Details
- First published
- 1898
- Language
- Español
- Reading time
- 2 h 35 min
- Level
- Medium level
Cite this edition
Shaw, Bernard. Mrs. Warren's Profession. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/mrs-warren-s-profession.
Shaw, B. (2026). Mrs. Warren's profession. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/mrs-warren-s-profession (Original work published 1898)
Shaw, Bernard. Mrs. Warren's Profession. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/mrs-warren-s-profession.
@book{shaw2026mrs,
author = {Shaw, Bernard},
title = {Mrs. Warren's Profession},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/mrs-warren-s-profession},
note = {First published 1898}
}
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What is Mrs Warren's Profession about?
It follows Vivie Warren, a young Cambridge mathematician, as she meets her mother and discovers how the family's comfort was paid for. Shaw uses her story to question respectability, money and the choices open to poor women.
Why was Mrs Warren's Profession banned?
The Lord Chamberlain's censor refused to license it because of its subject. Shaw says it reached the stage only in January 1902, in private performances given by the Stage Society in London.
What does the title Mrs Warren's Profession mean?
It refers to the trade Mrs Warren practises and manages. Shaw argues in his preface that the real subject is the society that leaves poor women with few choices, not just one woman.
The author
Bernard Shaw
1856–1950 · Irish playwright and critic
George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) was an Irish playwright and critic. Born in Dublin, he moved to London in 1876 and later lived in Ayot St Lawrence, Hertfordshire, where he died. His plays include Arms and the Man (1894), Man and Superman (1903), Major Barbara (1905), and Pygmalion (1912).
More by Bernard Shaw
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