SOURCE: Rusinko, Susan. “Morality Plays for Mid-Century or Man, God, and the Devil.” In Terence Rattigan, pp. 96-113. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1983.

In the following essay, Rusinko analyzes how Rattigan's plays matured after the transformation in British drama in 1956, and contrasts Rattigan's work with other British playwrights of the time.

A New Hero: Jimmy Porter

During the long two-year West End run of Separate Tables, the inevitable occurred. The long-awaited stage revolution finally erupted on 8 May 1956. Its force unleashed repressions of the economic-cultural anger in post-World War II England and disrupted prevailing stage conventions. Writers, actors, directors—indeed the entire theatrical community—felt the impact of the history-making Look Back in Anger by John Osborne. Its leading character is the angry young Jimmy Porter, trapped in a dead-end existence in the midlands of England and also trapped in his marriage. For him there are no more great causes, and...