At the time the play was compared to George Bernard Shaw's "Saint Joan", which was also noted for the refreshingly modern and lighthearted language with which the medieval characters were portrayed speaking. The play depicts Richard in the light of the pacifism that was prevalent at the time, after the carnage of World War I. Richard is portrayed as a gentle, refined individual in a brutal militaristic culture, whose "struggle for peace is fine and ennobling". The depiction of Richard intentionally diverged radically from Shakespeare's portrayal of him as a self-dramatising narcissist preoccupied with his divine right to rule.