An Entertaining Poseur

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 266, 6 August 1931, Page 11

An Entertaining Poseur

Sir, —Will you pennit me to' vent through your columns a little steam concerning Mr. George Bernard Shaw, whose visit to Russia is at present regarded With so much widespread interest? It is now a considerable number of years ago since "G. 8.5. discovered in one of the many literary alcoves of the Irish Metropolis, the mantle once worn by the great satirist. Dean Swift. Others th.re had been as well who came across this same mantle, but who returned it to / its peg, having tried it on, and found it too shabby, or too large, or too something not suitable. Not so, however, George Bernard. He took it down, and bpd it cleaned and renovated to suit modern requirements; and garbed therewith he slipped across the Irish Channel to search for a niche of fame in London’s hall of literary effort. Before entering therein he knew that Dickens had already taught the English people not to froth at the mouth when ridiculed; to stop pulling long faces when things went ill with them; and to treat satire for what it was wor.h—amusement!

In passing, be it said that “G.B.S/’ With all the soil made fertile for him by the author of “Micawber,” has not as yet written anything likely to remain as memorable as, say, “Gulliver’s Travels,” by the original owner of the mantle already referred to. Dean Swift was not understood in his day by the “phlegmatic Saxbn,” and he was never forgiven wliile he lived for his advice to Ireland—to “burn everything that came from England, except her coal.” Such advice coming to-day from Shaw would be greeted as a further gem in his crown of satirical geniud. ' a And this is the man who goes to Russia with nn astrachan cup, and a merry little twinkle in his eye. Before he was three days in that land of dubious happenings, he writes home to say that Russian ideals of government were O.K. Well, whether right or whether wrong, who takes “G. 8.5. seriously? None but his paymasters who know his value as an entertainer. England would be a rather melancholy place to-day without its brainy jesters to balance the gloomy outlook of some of her literary high-brows. What an asset, for instance, he would be in New Zealand at present, to save the Dominion by his remedial literary pills, from the danger of chronic indigestion through recent tax gorging. At Home pt least no one reads anything from the pen of this latest admirer of _ Russian methods without wearing a quizzical countenance. Not even Dean Inge, I presume to say, would think of treating the emanations . of this Coxcombical Celt with the contemptuous conjunction—Pshaw I —Yours, etc, “BALLYFATTON.” Wellington.