Why [Look Back in Anger] no longer generates [its early] enthusiasm is the purpose of this essay, for if we respond to Look Back in Anger at all today we do so because it is an event …, not because it is a play that sucks us into its world and compels us to accept that world on its own terms. (p. 47)

Look Back in Anger deals with a social theme; it is clearly dependent upon its dramatic antecedents (most notably a conventional plot packaged in a well-made play); and its characters are conscious of class, that is to say they are traditional rather than innovative. Yet … it introduces a new element into drama, an element of such proportions that it has been changing the form of drama (though not its substance) ever since.

I want to discuss this new element (actually, it is an old element that Osborne...