SHAW'S GRIM HUMOUR

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 672, 25 May 1929, Page 28

SHAW'S GRIM HUMOUR

WILLING TO LOSE HEAD Mr. George Bernard Shaw is willing to have his head cut off, according to a letter he is reported to have written to a Berlin friend who wrote asking him for his opinion on some experiments by the Russian Professor Brauthenento on living dogs. The professor claims that he cut oft' the head of a dog and kept it alive tor three hours by a process of pumping to keep the blood circulating through the braiu. Mr. Shaw considers these experiments to be very interesting, but he is opposed to trials being made on a criminal whose life, he says, is not worth being prolonged in such a way. For Science’s Sake The experiment, he continues, ought to be made on a mau of science, for instance, on one who is suffering from a growth in the stomach. By the adoption of the professor’s method the scientist's brain could be freed from the effect of the growth in the bod} - , the blood circulation being artificially maintained. Thus the man could continue to give lectures, make speeches and give advice without being hampered by the affliction of the body. “I am quite willing,” Mr. Shaw says, "to have my own head cut off, so that T can continue to dictate my books, etc., without being troubled by sickness or by the necessity of dressing, or eating, and have nothing else to do hut to produce works of dramatic art and literature.

"I, of course, expect one or two of the vivisectionists to try the experiment first on themselves and convince me of its practicability.”