MR SHAW IN AMERICA

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21980, 15 June 1933, Page 14

MR SHAW IN AMERICA

, KING’S ENGLISH PUZZLES “ MILD ” POLITICAL VIEWS. As Mr Bernard Shaw's visit passes into history, it can at least be said that it is an event without parallel in the annals of New York. No eminent man of letters (stated the special correspondent of the London Observer) has before been treated by reporters and photographers in similar fashion. Ilis stay lasted 26 hours and was accorded' a vast extent of newspaper space, many pages recording his collective interview with the pressmen, who surpassed even the New York record of childlikeness and irrelevance in their questions, while the repeated assault of movie men involved a very severe strain on the physical and nervous resources of s veteran nearing 77. His quickness and sustained good humour arc astonishing when the extent and fury of the barrage are considered. Only in his encounter with his merciless newsreel assailants did he for a few moments lose command of his wits and his temper. The great meeting in the Opera House was a spectacle that will be Jong remembered. The audience of 5000 was remarkably representative. The quick response at intervals from the high gal lery showed that Mr Shaw's voice carried easily, although he seemed to be speaking with the conversational ease customary with him. He used only a few scraps of notes and finished at the end of 00 minutes, apparently ns fresh as at the start, FROM CHINA TO PERU. Those who expected continuous flashes were doubtless disappointed. Probably

the majority of Mr Shaw’s auditors were somewhat’puzzled by the wide discursiveness of the address, ranging from the Presidency of the Mormons, from the gold standard and foreign investments to the Soviets, war debts, and the speaker’s personal obligation to Henry George. The comments which I have heard, continued the correspondent, touch most frequently upon Mr Shaw’s misreading of recent American history, the mildness of his political doctrine, and his evident reluctance to adventure into deeper social problems. His lively attack upon the methods and failures of bankers was most widely applauded, since at no time has America' been so disrespectful and ready to agree with critics of money power. By far the most general interest in the speech hitherto is of the kind that must seem exceedingly strange to the British public. While Mr Shaw, was speaking the National Broadcasting Company received several hundreds of telephone calls from radio listeners throughout 'he country. A small number only of these were protests against 'Mr Shaw’s being allowed to broadcast offensive criticisms of American institutions. The large majority were from people wlm challenged the speaker’s use of the English tongue. This is, of course, an unprecedented experience for him. FURORE AMONG LISTENERS. 1 learn from the National Broadcasting Company that his pronunciation of some half a dozen words created nothing less than a furore among the immense listening multitude of the western hemisphere, while ■ ■ teachers everywhere are excited, Americans find it impossible to believe that the most renowned of English authors, although an Irishman, should be permitted to lengthen the first vowel of “evolution” and to pronounce the first vowel in privacy as, in Privy Council! It is to them incredible that Mr Shaw should

be following the accepted English usage when he stresses the second syllable in “ financier.” The universal American practice is to say, “ finnan seer,” as in “ finnan liaddie.”

The day after the departure of the Empress of Britain, your correspondent was invited to the National Broadcasting headquarters to address a gathering of announcers and kindred members of the staff, and to meet a lire of questions as to these examples and others. Were they acknowledged as standard in England, or were they to be taken merely as specimens of Shavian eccentricity? Could you, I ask, imagine a more curious and ironic result of Bernard Shaw’s tip-and-run invasion of America!