Irish playwright, critic, and polemicist (1856–1950)
George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence simply as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist with a range incorporating both contemporary satire and historical allegory. He wrote more than sixty plays, including such works as Man and Superman (1902), Pygmalion (1913) and Saint Joan (1923). Shaw was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1925.
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BROADBENT [stiffly]. Devil is rather a strong expression in that
connexion, Mr Keegan.
KEEGAN. Not from a man who knows that this world is hell. But
since the word offends you, let me soften it, and compare you
simply to an ass. [Larry whitens with anger].
BROADBENT [reddening]. An ass!
KEEGAN [gently]. You may take it without offence from a madman
who calls the ass his brother — and a very honest, useful and
faithful brother too. The ass, sir, is the most efficient of
beasts, matter-of-fact, hardy, friendly when you treat him as a
fellow-creature, stubborn when you abuse him, ridiculous only in
love, which sets him braying, and in politics, which move him to
roll about in the public road and raise a dust about nothing. Can
you deny these qualities and habits in yourself, sir?
BROADBENT [goodhumoredly]. Well, yes, I'm afraid I do, you know.
KEEGAN. Then perhaps you will confess to the ass's one fault.
BROADBENT. Perhaps so: what is it?
KEEGAN. That he wastes all his virtues — his efficiency, as you
call it — in doing the will of his greedy masters instead of doing
the will of Heaven that is in himself. He is efficient in the
service of Mammon, mighty in mischief, skilful in ruin, heroic in
destruction. But he comes to browse here without knowing that the
soil his hoof touches is holy ground. Ireland, sir, for good or
evil, is like no other place under heaven; and no man can touch
its sod or breathe its air without becoming better or worse. It
produces two kinds of men in strange perfection: saints and
traitors. It is called the island of the saints; but indeed in
these later years it might be more fitly called the island of the
traitors; for our harvest of these is the fine flower of the
world's crop of infamy. But the day may come when these islands
shall live by the quality of their men rather than by the
abundance of their minerals; and then we shall see.
LARRY. Mr Keegan: if you are going to be sentimental about
Ireland, I shall bid you good evening. We
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Die Walküre is endured by the average man because it contains four scenes for which he would sit out a Scotch sermon, or even a House of Commons debate. These are the love duet in the first act, Brunnhilde's announcement of death in the second, the ride of the Valkyries and the 'fire-charm' in the third. For them the ordinary playgoer endures hours of Wotan, with Christopher Sly's prayer in his heart. 'Would 'twere over!' Now, I am one of those elect souls who are deeply moved by Wotan. I grant you that as a long-winded, one-eyed gentleman backing a certain champion in a fight and henpecked out of his fancy because his wife objects to the moral character of the champion, he is a dreary person indeed . . . but to one who has understood all its beauties, its lofty aspirations, its tragedy, there is nothing trivial, nothing tedious in Die Walküre.