SOURCE: Harben, Niloufer. “Three Plays of the 1960s.” In Twentieth-Century English History Plays: From Shaw to Bond, pp. 156-212. Houndmills, England: Macmillan Press, 1988.

In the following excerpt, Harben identifies sources for Osborne's Luther and describes the critical reaction to the play.

John Osborne's Luther presents another instance of a playwright being drawn to a historical subject for its religious interest. Yet Osborne's approach and achievement vary significantly from Bolt's and Shaffer's. His play, an arresting psychological study of a turbulent individual, at odds with himself and the social and religious institutions of his time, is one of considerably greater force and depth. Like Bolt, Osborne incorporates many of his central historical figure's recorded sayings into the dialogue of his play, but, unlike Bolt, he is able to match them with an urgent vital language of his own. This often results in impressive flights of rhetorical virtuosity or sequences...