Critical Responses to John Osborne's LUTHER

There are many different reviews of John Osborne's play Luther including one by theatre critic Charles Marowitz and one by theatre scholar David Graver. In Marowitz's review he concentrates on how Luther relates to Osborne's other plays, specifically Look Back in Anger, The Entertainer and The World of Paul Slickey. He focuses on the idea that this is not a departure, as he calls it, or a work outside the realm of Osborne's writing styles. He continues to talk about the temperature of the play as being just as hot as his earlier works but that the heat comes from a different place (the early place sought social justice while Luther speaks from bitterness and difference of opinion). He also compares the way the piece uses tableaus and images through the play to the work of Brecht.

Graver also compares Luther to the work of Brecht and his ideas of epic theatre but claims that if we make that comparison then we must also declare the play a failure (based on the ideals of Brechtian dramaturgy). This mostly comes from the lack of historical representation of the play's main character, Martin Luther. In addition to the misreporting of facts, Graver also accuses Osborne of selling the titular character short by not highlighting his "intellectual powers". He goes on to say that this puts increasingly problematic limitations on his protagonist.