Editing George Bernard Shaw (section)

===Early years===
[[File:Dublin Portobello 33 Synge Street George Bernard Shaw Birthplace 2.JPG|thumb|upright|alt=Exterior of modest city house|Shaw's birthplace (2012 photograph). The plaque reads "Bernard Shaw, author of many plays, was born in this house, 26 July 1856".]]
Shaw was born at 3 Upper Synge Street{{refn|Now (2016) known as 33 Synge Street.{{sfn|Peters|1996|p=5}}|group=n}} in [[Portobello, Dublin|Portobello]], a lower-middle-class part of [[Dublin]].{{sfn|Ervine 1959 DNB archive}} He was the youngest child and only son of George Carr Shaw and Lucinda Elizabeth (Bessie) Shaw (''née'' Gurly). His elder siblings were Lucinda (Lucy) Frances and Elinor Agnes. The Shaw family was of [[Anglo-Irish people|English descent]] and belonged to the dominant [[Protestant Ascendancy]] in Ireland;{{refn|Shaw's biographer [[Michael Holroyd]] records that in 1689 Captain William Shaw fought for [[William III of England|William III]] at the [[Battle of the Boyne]], for which service he was granted a substantial estate in [[Kilkenny]].{{sfn|Holroyd|1997|p=2}}|group=n}} George Carr Shaw, an ineffectual alcoholic, was among the family's less successful members.{{sfn|Holroyd|1997|p=2}} His relatives secured him a [[sinecure]] in the civil service, from which he was pensioned off in the early 1850s; thereafter he worked irregularly as a corn merchant.{{sfn|Ervine 1959 DNB archive}} In 1852 he married Bessie Gurly; in the view of Shaw's biographer [[Michael Holroyd]] she married to escape a tyrannical great-aunt.{{sfn|Shaw|1969|p=22}} If, as Holroyd and others surmise, George's motives were mercenary, then he was disappointed, as Bessie brought him little of her family's money.{{sfn|Holroyd|1997|pp=5–6}} She came to despise her ineffectual and often drunken husband, with whom she shared what their son later described as a life of "shabby-genteel poverty".{{sfn|Shaw|1969|p=22}}

By the time of Shaw's birth his mother had become close to George John Lee, a flamboyant figure well known in Dublin's musical circles. Shaw retained a lifelong obsession that Lee might have been his biological father;{{sfn|Weintraub|2013}} there is no consensus among [[wikt:Shavian|Shavian]] scholars on the likelihood of this.{{sfn|Holroyd|1997|pp=13–14}}{{sfn|Rosset|1964|pp=105 and 129}}{{sfn|Dervin|1975|p=56}}{{sfn|O'Donovan|1965|p=108}} The young Shaw suffered no harshness from his mother, but he later recalled that her indifference and lack of affection hurt him deeply.{{sfn|Bosch|1984|pp=115–117}} He found solace in the music that abounded in the house. Lee was a conductor and teacher of singing; Bessie had a fine [[mezzo-soprano]] voice and was much influenced by Lee's unorthodox method of vocal production. The Shaws' house was often filled with music, with frequent gatherings of singers and players.{{sfn|Ervine 1959 DNB archive}}

In 1862 Lee and the Shaws agreed to share a house, No. 1 Hatch Street, in an affluent part of Dublin, and a country cottage on [[Dalkey Hill]], overlooking [[Killiney Bay]].{{sfn|Holroyd|1990|pp=27–28}} Shaw, a sensitive boy, found the less salubrious parts of Dublin shocking and distressing, and was happier at the cottage. Lee's students often gave him books, which the young Shaw read avidly;{{sfn|Holroyd|1997|pp=23–24}} thus, as well as gaining a thorough musical knowledge of choral and operatic works, he became familiar with a wide spectrum of literature.{{sfn|Holroyd|1997|pp=24 (literature) and 25 (music)}}

Between 1865 and 1871 Shaw attended four schools, all of which he hated.{{sfn|Holroyd|1997|pp=19–21}}{{refn|The four schools were the [[Wesley College (Dublin)|Wesleyan Connexional School]], run by the [[Methodist Church in Ireland]]; a private school near [[Dalkey]]; Dublin Central Model Boys' School; and the Dublin English Scientific and Commercial Day School.{{sfn|Holroyd|1997|pp=19–21}}|group=n}} His experiences as a schoolboy left him disillusioned with formal education: "Schools and schoolmasters", he later wrote, were "prisons and turnkeys in which children are kept to prevent them disturbing and chaperoning their parents."{{sfn|Shaw|1949|pp=89–90}} In October 1871 he left school to become a junior clerk in a Dublin firm of [[land agent]]s, where he worked hard, and quickly rose to become head cashier.{{sfn|Weintraub|2013}} During this period, Shaw was known as "George Shaw"; after 1876, he dropped the "George" and styled himself "Bernard Shaw".{{refn|Shaw's loathing of the name George began in his childhood.{{sfn|Nothorcot|1964|p=3}} He never succeeded in persuading his mother and sister to stop calling him by the name, but he made it known that everyone else who had any respect for his wishes should refrain from using it—"I hate being George-d".{{sfn|Nothorcot|1964|pp=3–4 and 9}}|group=n}}

In June 1873 Lee left Dublin for London and never returned. A fortnight later, Bessie followed him; the two girls joined her.{{sfn|Weintraub|2013}}{{refn|By Shaw's account, Lee left Ireland because he had outgrown the musical possibilities of Dublin; in fact, Lee had overreached himself by trying to oust [[Robert Prescott Stewart|Sir Robert Stewart]] as the city's leading conductor. Stewart, professor of music at [[Trinity College Dublin|Trinity College]], denounced him as a charlatan, and succeeded in driving him out.{{sfn|O'Donovan|1965|p=75}}|group=n}} Shaw's explanation of why his mother followed Lee was that without the latter's financial contribution the joint household had to be broken up.{{sfn|Westrup|1966|p=58}} Left in Dublin with his father, Shaw compensated for the absence of music in the house by teaching himself to play the piano.{{sfn|Weintraub|2013}}