Scholarly Research Journal for Humanity Science & English Language,

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PEER REVIEWED & REFEREED JOURNAL, OCT-NOV, 2022, VOL-10/54
JOHN GALSWORTHY’ ‘STRIFE’: AN ANALYTICAL STUDY

Prof. Surekha Baburao Bhosle

Jr. Lecturer, Higher Secondary Ashram School, Chavanwadi, Tq. Mukhed, Dist. Nanded.
E-mail: bhoslesurekha123@[Link]

Paper Received On: 25 NOV 2022

Peer Reviewed On: 30 NOV 2022
Published On: 1 DEC 2022

Scholarly Research Journal's is licensed Based on a work at [Link]

INTRODUCTION:
John Galsworthy is well known as both a novelist and a dramatist. In his works the
characters are governed by the social forces that dominate men’s life. According to
Galsworthy’s characters are “As powerless to escape society as the tragic hero is to escape
his fate.”(1) Moreover he states that, society is a corrupting force operating with a dual
standard of morality and justice, one for the rich and the other for the poor.
John Galsworthy has written his play Strife in 1909 in London. The thing that makes
this play interested is that the play foretells the great strike in 1911 and 1926. This play does
not retell the Industrial history. John Galsworthy’s Strife is called is called a prophetic
foresight drama.
It was his third most successful play of the three. Galsworthy was a modern
dramatist. He wrote well made plays dealing with social problems. He follows the trend set
by realist and naturalist theatre. As a pragmatic, social thinker and oritic. Galsworthy
established himself as one of the prominent and influential playwrights in the history of
English Literature. He wanted to shed new light on the dark aspect or his contemporary
society to bring about a significant change in the outdated social structure or the day. In
order to fulfill the craving or his spirit, he wanted to focus on social, economic, domestic or
personal problems : the disparity between the rich and the poor, the clash between the labour
and the capital, social and legal injustice, domestic tyranny, the class conflict, and unhappy
marriage. He wanted to focus on the sensibility or awareness concerning the evils of the
people through the burning social problems of his contemporary England. He had a profound

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humanitarian outlook of lie and he tried to the best of his ability to adopt a realistic attitude.
His realistic plays are shaped and inspired by high intention and imagination.
Galsworthy considered Strife his best play. It was written in 1907 and produced by
Charles Forhmann at the Duke of York’s Theater in 1909, when it was received with
universal acclaim; even those few dissenting voices who spoke of excessive impartiality
amounting to indifference and cynicism were loud in their praise of the play’s construction
and technical perfection. During the years that have elapsed since then the play’s technical
merits have been absorbed into the general pattern of the development of drama, and
nowadays one hears carping critics speaking of super flours characters, lack of dramatic
tension, sentimentality and so on.
“Ultimately Strife is a real time-wrap, but one that’s actually quite enjoyable if you go
in with the right mindset and a fair bit or patience. For the low price it’s certainly worth a
punt, but those expecting a polished modern day experience might go away scratching their
heals.”(2)
PLOT CONSTRUCTION OF STRIFE:
That plot structure of John Galsworthy’s Strife begins with the meeting between John
Galsworthy’s Anthony as the chairman and the directors of the Trenartha Tin Plate works
such as Edgar Anthony, Fredric H. Wilder, William Scantlebury, and Oliver Wanklin. They
talk about the position and the attitude of the company during the strike. By this strike. The
company loses the customers and the shares go down, and these bring the company into a bad
situation. The snows that fall down during the strike also make the condition of the workmen
worse.
We can understand how John Galsworthy showed the theories of tragedy in order to
know whether the downfall of the two opposite leaders in his Strife can be classified as tragic
downfall. According to perinne, the down fall can be categorized as tragic downfall when the
downfall of the hero is caused by his own mistakes or the result of his own free choice not the
accident, villainy of fate.
In John Galsworthy’s Strife, Anthony’s and Robert’s downfalls are not caused by
accident, villainy or even fate. Their downfalls are the result of their greatness and
responsibility as the leader of two different groups of people. Anthony, the chairman, of the
Trenartha Tin Plate works defend his decision to refuse all the workmen’s demands.
Meanwhile, Robert, the leader of the committee also has to defend his decision to force the

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directors to fulfill the workmen’s demands. Finally, the directors leave Anthony and the men
leave Roberts. They have sacrificed many things to win, but all their sacrifices are nothing.
Strife was Galsworthy’s third play. ‘After The Silver Box’ (1906), which was
successful and joy (1907), which failed. He wrote it in a few months in 1907, and sent the
manuscript to friends for comment, including Edward Garnett and Joseph Conrad. After
being refused by several theatre managers a successful production in Manchester led to its
production in London by Charles Frohman at the Duke of York’s Theatre, opening on 9 th
March 1909 for the first of six matinee performances. It was well received and the play was
transferred to the Haymarket Theatre, then to the Adelphi Theatre for evening performances.
It attracted much attention. A reviewer in The Times wrote :
“When an artist of Mr. Galsworthy’s high Endeavour, mental equipment and
technical skill writes a play like strife, he has done much more than write a
play, he has rendered a public service.”(3)
In New York it opened at the New Theatre on 17 November, 1909. It was one of the
first plays proeduced at this theatre, which had opened on 6th November. The action takes
place on 7th February at the Trenartha Tin Plate works, on the borders of England and Wales.
For several months there has been a strike at the factory. Strife is a play concerning the clash
between capital and labour, the waste of force involved in the caste, feeling of capital pitted
against the caste-feeling of labour. The memesis of extremism the conflict between opposing
wills the lack of cohesion between leaders and the followers, the conflict of intransigent
personalities, the inability of peace and prosperity, and fanaticism and inflexibility in a
industrial society. It also focuses on the social comflicts of industrial life and retard
production between John Antony, the Chairman of the Trenortha Tin Plate works, and David
Robert, the strike leader of the workers. Through this play, Galsworthy wanted to highlight
the revolutionary passions of the common workers, against their ruling class for their rights
of early 20th Century English.
The first act of the strife starts with the directors, concerned about the damage to the
company, hold a board meeting at the home of the manager of the works. Simon Harness,
representing the trade Union that has withdrawn support for the ‘Strike’, tells them he will
make the men withdraw their excessive demands, and the directors should agree to the unions
demands. David Roberts leaders or men’s committee, tells them he wants the strike to
continue until their demands are met, although the men are starving. It is a confrontation
between the elderly company chairman John Antony and Roberts.
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After the meeting, Enid Underwood daughter of John Antony and wife of the
manager, talks to her father : she is aware of the suffering of the families, Robert’s wife
Annie used to be hermaid she is also worried about the strain of the affair on her father.
Henry Tench company secretary, tells Anthony he may be outvoted by the Board. In
Act II, Scene I Enid Visits the Boert’s cottage, and talks to Annie Roberts, who has a heart
condition. When David Roberts comes in Enid tells him there must be a compromise, and
that he should have more pity on his wife : he does not change his position, and he is
unmoved by his wife’s concerns for the families of the strikers.
In Act II, Scene II, in an open space near the factory, a platform has been improvised.
Harness was giving a speech to the strikes, says they have been ill advised and they should
cut their demands, instead or starving; they should support the union, who will support them.
There are short speeches from two men, who have contrasting opinions. Roberts goes to the
platform and in a long speech, says that the fight is against capital, “a white-faced, stony-
hearted monster.”(4)
“Ye have got it on its knees; are ye to give up at the last minute to save your
miserable bodies pain?”(5) When news is brought that his wife has died Roberts leaves and
the meeting peters out.
In Act III opened in the home of the manager, Enid talks with Edgar Anthony, he is
the chairman’s son and one of the directors. She is less sympathetic now towards the men
and concerned about their father, says Edgar should support him. However, Edgar’s
sympathies are with the men. They receive the new that Mrs. Roberts has died. The
director’s meeting who was already bad tempered, is affected by the news. Edgar says he
would rather resign than go on starving women; the other directors react badly to and an
opinion put so frankly.
He puts to the board the motion that the dispute should be place in the hands or
Harness. All the directors are in favour; Anthony alone is not in favour and he resigns. The
men’s committee, including Roberts and Harness come into receive the result. Roberts
repeated his resistance but on being told the both been thrown over. The agreement is what
had been proposed before strike began.
THEMES/PROBLEMS IN STRIFE:
Poverty:
Between 1900 and 1914, though the plight of the poorer classes was serious some
afforts were being made to improve it, and if those efforts were perhaps not as effective and
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as through as they might have been they represented a positive, almost revolutionary advance
from conditions in the earlier part of the Victorian period.
John Galsworthy, however, was so little satisfied with the progress that was being
made in ameliorating the lot of the poor that nearly all of his first period works were
concerned in some degree with that matter. The Island Pharisees (1904) concerned itself
chiefly with the problems of the ‘outcast’ class, which was concreted in the persons like
Ferrand, Carolan, The Irishman and Joahue Creed.
The Silver Box (1906) indicates the destructive effect of unemployment on a man of
the working class largely because of resentment at his failure to get work. Jones commits his
theft of the silver box. In addition he cruel to his wife, and takes to drink, because as his wife
explains, “He’s been out of work two months and it preys upon his mind.”(6)
The play Strife (1907), puts the blame for ths extreme poverty of the workers for a
large industrial firm squarely on the shoulders of the chaiman and the board of directors of
the company. These gentry, “thought that not to pay more wages than …………. Necessary
was the A B C of commerce.”(7) Refuse the worker’s request for better wages. After six
months of refusal to settle the strike, during which the workers and their families suffer
greatly from cold and hunger, the board of directors become fearful of the trouble the
stockholders will cause them if the strike interferes with further dividens, and grant slight
wage increases. The implication Galsworthy made here were that a little generosity on the
part of the company and its stockholders, but that any such feeling was deliberately put aside
in the interests of high profits.
Social Realism:
John Galsworthy’s play strife (1907), here his dramatic art was absorbed into the
general development or English realist theatre. Some horsh critics of today who become
oblivious of Galsworthy’s age speak of superfluous characters, lack of dramatic tension and
sentimentalization of the situation arising out of the death of Mrs. Roberts, the wife of the
Strike-Leader Mr. Roberts. Despite its negligible flaws, strife was a great success in London
and in New Yrok and later on in Vienna in 1913. Its popularity is of lasting nature because it
partrays the eternal battle between capital and labour, the employees and the employees. The
rise to real power of the English labour movement early in the 20th Century provided a
subject suited to Galsworthy’s realistic method : Strife comes closest, among his plays to a
work of lasting value. Through the careful dramatic opposition or ideas characters,
metaphors, and structural elements.
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It realizes that how the people got in the grim and despair due to ‘Strike’. There
should be reconciliation between the two parties since unnecessary strikes and lock-outs
hamper the progress of industrial life and retard production. Galsworthy conslructed the play
so that its spire of meaning would arise from the dialectic of the opposing concepts
represented by Anthony and Roberts. They refuse to compromise their principles by giving
into the other side; their rigidity of purpose shows a kind of heroic intellectual vainglory,
producing bitterness, suffering waste and death. The play has no heroes in the traditional
sense of the word. Neither Roberts nor Anthony is a heroic figures. They are the two best
men. Bothe of them are broken. Galsworthy makes neither Anthony nor Roberts a man who
governs events. Both have from will and are determined to fight to the bitter end, but they
are not drawn in individualistic heroic terms. The one takes his strength from what may be
called the capitalist faith, the other from the faith of the rebels.
From the previous description, it is clearly seen that Anthony has a principle that there
is a barrier between two different classes. One class is higher than the other and in this case,
Antony’s class is higher than the workmen.
SOCIO-ECONOMIC LIFE OF WOMEN IN STRIFE:
John Galsworthy never forgets to regard socio-economic life struggles or working
class women. As the title “Strife” suggests, their life is full of troubles and tribulations. How
they overcome these challenges thrown at them by life and society is what makes them
strong. Although strife centers on the conflict between labour and capital, the encompasses
the socio-economic life of working class women. The predicament of the women in the wake
up or the strike has been brought into full focus and calls for their redemption not only from
the fetter of starvation but also from the domination of men.
On the side of the workers, the women and children are enduring the greatest
privations through cold and hunger for the winter has been exceptionally severe.
The company had the very worst time continued for five months. Bitter cold, winder
and the resentrement among the workers is also bitter.
For social dramas are meant to depict topical problems and as such a zealous
reformative spirit thus informs them. In this play Galsworthy has tried to achieve the
impossible and he has succeeded as much as in the nature of the impressible task allowed
him. As Mrs. Roberts, aged about thirty-five is a very patient and forbearing woman. She
knows her husband well and tells her friends madge that the striking workers.(8)
“Won’t beat Roberts” when her employer Mr. Enid asks Mrs. Roberts.
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“Can’t you stop his going Annie? Have you tried? Does he know how will you
are.”(9)
Galsworthy maintains that women must have their way and say. They are not merely
“breeders”. They are men’s best companion. They have a certain place in society and should
get due recognition. Women are not heard simply because they depend on men for all their
needs, even for their bread…. It is only the stubbornness of Roberts but also the economic
and emotional dependence or Mrs. Roberts which leads to her death for want of care.
Playwright’s impassioned plea, though tacit, is that women must not remain deaf and dumb.
They must come forward, become articulate and vindicate their position as compared men.
SIGNIFICANCE OF THE PLAY:
The play largely centers about the two dominant figures: John Anthony the president
of the company, rigid autocratic and uncompromising; he is unwilling to make the slightest
concession although the men have been out for six months and are in a condition of semi-
starvation. On the other hand there is David Roberts, an uncompromising Revolutionist.
Who devotion to the workers and the cause of Freedom is at red-white heat. Between them
are the strikers, worn and weary with the terrible struggle driven and tortured by the awful
sight of poverty at home.
At a director’s meeting, attended by the company’s representatives from London,
Edgar, Anthony, the President’s son and a man of kindly feeling, pleads in behalf of the
strikers.
Edgar – I don’t see how we can get over it that to go on like this means starvation to
the men’s wives and families ………. It won’t kill the shareholders to miss a dividend or
two; I don’t see that that’s reason enough for knuckling under.
Wilder – H’m! shouldn’t be a bit surprised if that brute Roberts hadn’t got us down
here with the very same idea. I hate a man with a grievance.
Edgar – We didn’t pay him enough for his discovery. I always said that at the time.
Tench – Company made a hundred thousand out of his brains and paid him seven
hundred……….. that’s the way he goes on, Sir.(10)
The appalling state of the strikers is demonstrated by the women : Anna Roberts.
Sick with heart trouble and slowly dying for want or warmth and nourishment : Mrs. Rous, so
accustomed into privation that her present poverty seems easy compared with the misery of
her whole life. Into this dismal environment comes Enid, the president’s daughter with
delicacies and jams for Anni like many women or her station she imagines that a little
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sympathy will bridge the chasm between the classes, or as her father says, “you think with
your gloved hands you can cure the troubles or the century.”(11)
Enid does not know the life of Annie Robert’s class : that it is all a gamble from the
“time ‘e ‘s born to the time clies”.
David Roberts has all the mental and moral attributes of his adversary coupled with
the spirit of revoit and the inspiration of modern ideas. He, too, is consistent : he wants
nothing for his class short or complete victory. They will have to learn that men like David
Roberts are the very forces that have revolutionized the world and thus paved the way for
emancipation out of the clutches of the “White-Faced monster with bloody lips.” Towards a
brighter hourizon, a freer life, and a truer recognition of human values.
The play strife appeals on many levels of meaning…. It is a play about the clash
between capital and labour, the waste of force involved in the cast-feeling of capital pitted
against the caste feeling of labour, the nemesis of extremism, the conflict between apposing
wills, the generation gap represented by Anthony and his children Enid and Edgar, the lack
cohesion between opposing the leaders and the followers, the conflict or intransigent
personalities the inability to change with the times and lead a life of peace and prosperity, and
the logic that fanaticism and inflexibility alike over reach themselves in a society which
ought to thrive on mutual understanding, especially in trade disputes.
REFERENCE:
John Galsworthy: Strife A Drama in Three acts (2021), First Reprint, Indian Leather Complex,
15A/1, Golam Jilani Khan Road, Kolkata-700 039, p. 136
I bid, p. 149
John Galsworthy – Strife A Drama in Three Act : Book way Publishers and Distributors , Kolkata
first Reprint 2021, p. 110
Galsworthy John, “Strife”, Books Way, Indian Leather Complex, 15A/, Golam Jilani Khan Road,
Kolkata, p. 156
Mottram, R.H.: "John Galsworthy" (Longman, Green and Company, London), p. 321
AHardyce Nicoll: "British Drama" (George. G. Harrap and Company Limited, London), p. 352-353
Nicoll, AHardyce: "British Drama" ([Link] and Company Limited, London), p. 190-191
Schalit, Leon: "John Galsworthy, A Survey" (William Heinemann Limited, London. 1929), p. 121
Eric Gillet: "Ten Famous Plays of Galsworthy" (Duckworth), p. 196
Denny Agus Susanto : The Tragic Downfalls of The two leaders as seen in , John Galsworthy Strife ,
A Thesis, p. 95-110
John Galsworthy: Strife A Drama in Three acts (2021), First Reprint, Indian Leather Complex,
15A/1, Golam Jilani Khan Road, Kolkata-700 039, p. 81-85

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