12 h 40 minAudiobook7 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if we die before we have time to grow wise?
Bernard Shaw’s Back to Methuselah is a cycle of five connected plays that stretches from Eden into the far future. In the Beginning opens with Adam’s unease and Eve’s curiosity. The Serpent urges Eve to imagine what does not yet exist, while Cain brings a hunger for glory into this world of questions about birth, death, and the value of living.
In The Gospel of the Brothers Barnabas, clergyman Franklyn and biologist Conrad propose that people could live three hundred years through will. Politicians Lubin and Burge care more about their careers. The Thing Happens carries the question into a future Britain: can longer lives bring wiser government? Shaw uses wit, debate, and strange encounters to test humanity’s capacity to change.
What you’ll discover
- Eden’s restless first people Meet an anxious Adam and a brave Eve as they confront what life could become.
- A theory worth arguing over Follow the Barnabas brothers as they challenge politicians to think beyond votes and appearances.
- Wit against short thinking Enjoy Shaw’s jokes and sharp arguments about lives too brief to nurture wisdom.
- Tragedy of an Elderly Gentleman Encounter long-lived people whom the wider world regards with curiosity and turns to for guidance.
- Life reaching beyond itself Explore Shaw’s idea of a Life Force that strives to become more capable.
Who will love it
For readers who love plays of ideas, Shaw's wit, and big questions about evolution and humanity's future.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- Eden begins with fear and wonder
- Cain shows how short lives breed violence
- Two brothers and a daring theory
- Politicians meet a stranger future
- Long-livers and the people who consult them
- What Shaw really wants to say
Who’s who
- AdamThe first man, a gardener who fears death and boredom alike, and who must decide how long a life is worth having.
- EveThe first woman, curious and brave, who listens to the Serpent and grasps what birth and death could mean.
- The SerpentA voice of imagination who tells Eve how new life is made and urges her to wish for what does not yet exist.
- CainAdam and Eve's proud son, who scorns quiet work and wants glory, and who stands for the hurry of short lives.
- Franklyn BarnabasA clergyman who, with his brother, preaches that people could live three hundred years if they truly willed it.
- Conrad BarnabasFranklyn's brother, a biologist who gives the longevity idea its scientific shape and tries to persuade the politicians.
- LubinA cunning politician in the second play who cares more for votes and appearances than for any large idea.
- BurgeLubin's fellow politician, loud and practical, who treats the brothers' vision as an obstacle to his own career.
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Back to Methuselah
by Bernard Shaw · 1921
From Eden to the far future, Shaw asks whether centuries of life can give humanity the wisdom to govern itself.
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From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1 of 6
Eden begins with fear and wonder
The first play is called In the Beginning. Adam and Eve live in a garden where nothing is hard, and Adam is already uneasy. He has seen a fawn die, and he does not understand what has happened. Eve is troubled too, because she senses that living forever may be a burden as much as a gift.
Then the Serpent appears, and Shaw makes it a figure of curiosity and imagination. It tells Eve a secret about how new life is made, so that the world need not stay as it is. The idea of birth dazzles her. It also opens the idea of death, since a world with newcomers must make room for them.
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What is Back to Methuselah about?
It is a cycle of five plays that asks what would happen if humans lived for centuries. Shaw follows the idea from Eden through modern politics to a far future, arguing that longer life might make people wiser.
When was Back to Methuselah written and first staged?
Shaw published it in 1921 and it was first staged in New York in 1922. He wrote it in the aftermath of the First World War, when he was deeply troubled by the folly of European politics.
What does creative evolution mean in Shaw's play?
It is the idea that life changes through will and purpose rather than blind chance. Shaw believed a driving force in nature strives toward greater ability, and the plays dramatize that belief.
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).
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