Mrs Warren's Profession Analysis

What Are Your Morals Mother? – Mrs. Warren’s Profession

George Bernard Shaw’s Mrs. Warren’s Profession is a feminist play that emphasizes the injustice and inequality towards women in society on a professional and informal aspect. Mrs. Warren’s Profession highlights the concept of iconoclasm while mocking the typical plot of a play from nineteenth century London. In doing so Shaw exposes the reader to a diverse and unprecedented point-of-view that focuses on the rocky relationship between a sentimental mother and her practical daughter.

In the beginning of the play, Vivie Warren discovers her mother, Mrs. Warren’s, past occupation as a prostitute (Act II). Vivie respects her mother’s decision to work in the sex industry and sympathizes with

I am like you: I must have work, and must make more money than I spend. But my work is not your work, and my way is not your way” (Act IV). Vivie, just as her mother, wants to be wealthy, however she is not able to compromise her morals to gain a fortune. Vivie’s powerful and strong-willed personality derives from her morality, as it is the most influential aspect of her character. Her entire belief system is based upon being true to oneself. Therefore, when the news of her mother’s continued participation in the sex industry is revealed, Vivie realizes that Mrs. Warren and her differ on a moral level (Act III). It is no surprise that Vivie’s conscience is the reason she cannot carry out a relationship with her mother, as Shaw wrote Mrs. Warren’s Profession based on the ideals and beliefs of playwright Henrik Ibsen. In Ibsen’s The Wild Duck Greggers feels a moral obligation to tell Hialmar, his best friend, about his wife’s infidelity (Act III, 51). However, by doing so this means betraying his father, the other adulterer involved (Act III, 51). After Greggers exclaims, “but it’s thanks to you that I am continually haunted and harassed by a guilty conscience” (Act III, 51) he decides he must tell Hialmar. Ergo Vivie, like Greggers determines that she cannot carry out a relationship with her mother as it will negatively affect her conscience and jeopardize her

Vivie believes that the only way to stay true to herself is by cutting off all relations with Mrs. Warren. Although Vivie understands her mother’s desire for wealth, she cannot support her method of obtaining it without compromising her own beliefs. She is ashamed of her mother for continuing to aid to a profession where women are degraded and disrespected. Although Vivie says to her mother “I shall always respect your right to your own opinions and your own way of life” (Act II), by the end of Act III Vivie wants nothing to do with her mother or her mother’s lifestyle as her morality will not allow