ABSTRACT
The key concept in chaos is ‘sensitivity to initial conditions’. The most beautiful illustration of this term was given by the renowned English novelist and playwright J B Priestley in 1932 in his first play Dangerous Corner. Dangerous Corner is still being staged around the world 60 years later, long after Priestley’s death in 1984. Several years ago, a production of Dangerous Corner was staged in Niagara-on-the-Lake, by the Shaw Festival in Canada; writers such as Priestley and Agatha Christie are used from time to time to add some variety to George Bernard Shaw’s output. The 1988 production of Dangerous Corner at the old St George Theatre began innocently enough in a replica of a fine English country home. Edward Lorenz’s rediscovery of Poincare’s concept of chaos 30 years after the publication of Dangerous Corner gives one familiar with the play a peculiar deja vu feeling—something the time-haunted Priestley would have richly enjoyed.
