SOURCE: Langford, Larry L. “The Unsocial Socialism of John Osborne.” English Studies 78, no. 3 (May 1997): 237-57.

In the following essay, Langford contends that critical opinions of Osborne’s plays were often intertwined with opinions of his political intentions and integrity.

‘Socialism is an intellectual Proteus’.

(H. G. Wells, The New Machiavelli)

For a playwright so often recognized as important, and perhaps great, John Osborne suffered particularly harsh criticism concerning his dramatic competency and his political integrity. To be sure, he has his defenders who see in his work ‘a theatrical vitality which … makes much adverse criticism seem petty and pedantic’, but his plays often met with sharply negative reactions that at times had a particularly bitter edge, as though his failure to fulfill certain expectations constituted a kind of betrayal.¹ In the enthusiasm that greeted the first production of Look Back in Anger, many saw in Osborne's work a...