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Bernard Shaw and Modern Advertising

Prophet Motives

  • Book
  • © 2018

Overview

Authors:
  1. Christopher Wixson

    1. Eastern Illinois University, Charleston, USA

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  • Represents the first book to focus solely on Shaw’s participation in major ad campaigns for other products, and his complex understanding of the concept of 'advertising'
  • Employs rarely seen source material from trade journals belonging to the burgeoning field of professional advertising, medical journals, and internal agency publications
  • Explores the origins of contemporary techniques of celebrity marketing

Part of the book series: Bernard Shaw and His Contemporaries (BSC)

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Table of contents (5 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-ix
    Download chapter PDF

  2. Introduction: “Press as Corrected, G.B.S.”

    • Christopher Wixson
    Pages 1-30

  3. Prescription and Petrifaction: Proprietary Medicine, Health Marketing, and Misalliance

    • Christopher Wixson
    Pages 31-57

  4. “The Shadow of Disrepute”: G.B.S. and Testimonial Marketing

    • Christopher Wixson
    Pages 59-91

  5. “The Biggest Scoop in Advertising History”: Personality Marketing, G.B.S., and the Near-Testimonial

    • Christopher Wixson
    Pages 93-132

  6. “Those Magic Initials, G.B.S.”: Copywriting for the Irish Clipper

    • Christopher Wixson
    Pages 133-162

  7. Back Matter

    Pages 163-181
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Keywords

About this book

This book charts how promotional campaigns in which Bernard Shaw participated were key crucibles within which agency and personality could re-negotiate their relationship to one another and to the consuming public. Concurrent with the rise of modern advertising, the creation of Shaw’s 'G.B.S.' public persona was achieved through masterful imitation of patent medicine marketing strategies and a shrewd understanding of the relationship between product and spokesman. Helping to enhance the visibility of his literary writing and dovetailing with his Fabian political activities, 'G.B.S.' also became a key figure in the evolution of testimonial endorsement and the professionalizing of modern advertising. The study analyzes multiple ad series in which Shaw was prominently featured that were occasions for self-promotion for both Shaw and the agencies, and presage the iconoclastic style of contemporary 'public personality' and techniques of celebrity marketing.

Reviews

“In today’s culture so awash in celebrity endorsements, this clearly written study is illuminating, informative, and timely. It should prove most useful to scholars and students not only of Shaw, but also of media studies and cultural studies. It is a worthy addition to the very fine Bernard Shaw and His Contemporaries series.” (Sally Peters, author of the Choice award-winning biography Bernard Shaw: The Ascent of the Superman)

Authors and Affiliations

  • Eastern Illinois University, Charleston, USA

    Christopher Wixson

About the author

Christopher Wixson is Professor of English and Theatre Arts at Eastern Illinois University, USA. He teaches advanced courses in early modern drama and modernism, script analysis and dramaturgy, and general education courses in writing and literature. He has published widely on twentieth-century British and American drama and is General Editor of SHAW: The Journal of Bernard Shaw Studies.

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