''Un Petit Drame'' (1884) is a short play by George Bernard Shaw. It was Shaw's first completed dramatic work, and the only one written in French. The play was created because Shaw was practicing French with his friend Ida Beatty.

Michael Holroyd Sir Michael de Courcy Fraser Holroyd (born 27 August 1935) is an English biographer. Early life and education Holroyd was born in London, the son of Basil de Courcy Fraser Holroyd (a descendant of Sir George Sowley Holroyd, Justice of the King' ...

says that "''Un Petit Drame'' satirizes his uncle Walter Gurly's household, carries a number of jokes about his family and friends, and demonstrates his talent for rearranging autobiographical fragments so that they become absurdly foreign (literally so here) to himself." Walter Gurly was a ship's surgeon who was a colourful drunkard and, according to Shaw, "always in high spirits and full of humour that was barbarous in its blasphemous indecency". The play was unpublished during Shaw's lifetime. It was first published in 1959 in ''

Esquire Esquire (, ; abbreviated Esq.) is usually a courtesy title. In the United Kingdom, ''esquire'' historically was a title of respect accorded to men of higher social rank, particularly members of the landed gentry above the rank of gentlema ...

'', marketed as "Bernard Shaw's First and Hitherto Unpublished Play". The French text was accompanied by an English translation by Norman Denny and an introduction by Stanley Weintraub."Un Petit Drame; Bernard Shaw's First and Hitherto Unpublished Play", ''Esquire'', LII (December, 1959), 172-74.

References

{{George Bernard Shaw 1884 plays Plays by George Bernard Shaw