An Althusserian Reading of George Bernard Shaw’s The Devil’s Disciple in the Light of Cultural ISA

George Bernard Shaw, a satirist playwright, had been always at war to betray the fouls of his society and in so doing he was seeking the emendation of his nation. One of the best plays of him that directly tackles such follies is The Devil’s Disciple. This play can readily be read in the light of Louis Althusser’s notions of ISA, since both Shaw and Althusser were trying to reveal the ways through which different regimes make an attempt to institutionalize their ideology in their subjects. In this play we face with the deconstruction of the concept of “immorality” on the part of Shaw, where he manages to artistically reveal that such concepts are ideological and can easily be manipulated by the governments to meet their needs. In so doing, Shaw illuminates and at the same time decries the essentilalization of religious ISAs, most evidently represented by the priest and the puritan household of Dick. Finally, Shaw reveals that the concepts of morality/ immorality and religion are culturally and ideologically made up and their essentialistic description is a means of maintaining the dominant social class.

کلیدواژه ها:

George Bernard Shaw ، ” “Louis Althusser ، ” “Satire ، ” “Ideological Discourse ، ” “Cultural ISAs