George Bernard Shaw, the most influential 20th-century playwright, indisputably can claim the distinction as the best English dramatist ever since Shakespeare.

The English writer, poet, and philosopher G. K. Chesterton wrote about Bernard Shaw in his essays Shaw the Puritan,

He is a daring pilgrim who set out from the grave to find the cradle. He started from points of view which no one else was clever enough to discover, and he is at last discovering points of view which no one else was ever stupid enough to ignore.