ner that no benefit attaches to that denying one's fundamental humanity. Shaw's analysis of Ibsen's thesis takes the form of social commentary in essay form: "When we have achieved reforms enough to bring our institutions as far into harmony with the feelings of women as they now are with the feelings of men, there will be no Woman Question. No conflict, no question (444).
In Candida, the same line, given to Lexy, becomes a joke on male self-importance: "Ah, if you women only had the same clue to Man's strength that you have to his weakness, Miss Prossy, there would be no Woman Question" (Shaw, Candida 13). More generally, Shaw structures Candida to explore the obverse of the psychoemotional situation in A Doll House, presenting a woman who not only retains her persona but also lends nobility and dignity to it by enacting a role that enables a man to avoid the spoiling of his principles, his persona. The price for such an approach to married life is a certain emotional distance on Candida's part and emotional blindness on Morell's. But Candida is domestic comedy, not domestic drama, and this answer to the Woman Question moves toward Morell's insight that Candida's love for him has meant that she has played one socially sanctioned role so as to enable him to play another role that is not only socially sanctioned but also personally beneficial.
An important clue to understanding how Candida approaches her marriage is in her relationship with her father, Burgess. Burgess is very much a creature of the flower of England's Industrial Revolution, mercantilist, entrepreneurial, not remotely genteel but jus
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