Monologue

Mrs Warren Monologue from Mrs. Warren's Profession

From Mrs. Warren's Profession by George Bernard Shaw

female · anguished · 1:46 min

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No, you don’t. I do. She called herself a widow and had a fried-fish shop down by the Mint, and kept herself and four daughters out of it. Two of us were sisters: that was me and Liz; and we were both good-looking and well made. I suppose our father was a well-fed man: mother pretended he was a gentleman; but I don’t know. The other two were only half sisters: undersized, ugly, starved looking, hard working, honest poor creatures: Liz and I would have half-murdered them if mother hadn’t half-murdered us to keep our hands off them. They were the respectable ones. Well, what did they get by their respectability? I’ll tell you. One of them worked in a whitelead factory twelve hours a day for nine shillings a week until she died of lead poisoning. She only expected to get her hands a little paralyzed; but she died. The other was always held up to us as a model because she married a Government laborer in the Deptford victualling yard, and kept his room and the three children neat and tidy on eighteen shillings a week--until he took to drink. That was worth being respectable for, wasn’t it? VIVIE Did you and your sister think so?

About this piece

Mrs. Warren reflects on her difficult upbringing and the harsh realities faced by her family, contrasting her own life with that of her less fortunate sisters.

40s · sadness · family · identity · poverty · respectability

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