The Star. TUESDAY, JANUARY 12, 1915. THE INDISCRETIONS OF G. B. S.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 11284, 12 January 1915, Page 4

The Star. TUESDAY, JANUARY 12, 1915. THE INDISCRETIONS OF G. B. S.

Mr George Bernard Shaw's latest contribution to. the literature of the war has not been a. particularly hftppJ one. He has chosen to play the cynic at the wrong time and with rather bad taste. In a pamphlet entitled " Commonsense About the War," he dwells on the hypocritical nature of the British, likening Pecksniff and the villainous Angelo of Shakespeare s ' Measuie for Measure" as representative types of English national character. Sir Edward Grey is subjected to a great deal of * perverse qxiibbling which can do no 'good whatever, but may conceivably do much harm by playing into the hands of the enemy. Of course. it is Mr Shaw s forte to differ from everyone else, so it comes as no surprise to find, him criticising "the agreement by which the Allies bound themselves not to make terms of peace separately with Germany and stating that Britain was "hopelessly outwitted by Eastern diplomacy " and that "-we had to sign it." But when Mr Shaw talks about diplomacy he is dealing with something about which he knows very little. He even makes the ''astounding, statement that at the end pf, the war Russia will he free to " spring upon us quite unexpectedly the brilliant idea of annexing all Prusia."

In his endeavour to say smart things Mr Shaw lands himself into a mass of inconsistencies, but as long as he cau utter the unusual and something dif—rnt than the average man of his i country he is seemingly satisfied, says the causes of the war are X of on© and half a dozen of the .air," and yet he recognises that " we j,; were rasped beyond endurance by Prusi, sian militarism and its contempt for ■' us and for human happiness and human sense." Further, lie declares that 'i " the case for our action is as complete I as any casus belli is ever likely to be," '■ and that even if the Foreign Office had been the International Socialist Bureau, " had Sir Edward Grey been Jaures, I had Mr Ramsay Mac Donald been Prime Minister, had Russia been Germany's ally instead of ours, the result would E,till have been the same. We must have drawn the sword to save France and smash Potsdam as we smashed, and always must smash, Philip, Louis, Napoleon, et hoc genus omne."

. After all this the common person can' ;only sit silent a-ncl humbly .admire the Versatility of the genius that in one breath admits that we were right to go to war and in the next sneers at Sir Edward Grey for ascribing Britain's intervention to Germany's infringement of Belgium's neutrality. This "prevarication was totally unnecessary and unpopular, like most of these ingenuities which diplomatists think subtle and Machiavellian."

Bernard. Shaw's fellow Socialists f.t Home have severely trounced him for the sheer foolishness of his pamphlet and for the damage it is likoly to do by supplying; the Germans with the argument that at least one popular British author knows the Machiavellian side of the English character, Mr Robert | Blatchford in particular is severe on Mr Shaw. Writing in a recent number of the "Clarion" he characterises "'Common-sense About the War" as " a lamentable example of the irrepressible bumptiousness of a chartered libertine whose wit has degenerated into impertinence." "There are> times," he writes, " when even , the professional funambulist should \ assume a scemliness though he have it not. In the midst of the most awfnl tragedy in the known history of the world the cheap monkery, the rookless inaccuracy, and the cachinatory vulgarity of a tactless jester grata upon every decent ear." Mr Blatchford goes on to say that " CommoiiKense About the War" will be joy full" received and largely quoted in Germany and may perhaps bo taken more soriou«ly in neutral countries than it deserves. Then after scathingly denouncing Mr Shaw for endeavouring to exhibit his irony and cleverness at a time like this he gives the following advice to the workers: "I advise our working people to study the facts for themselves, and when some windy doctrin- | ait®, like George Bernard Shaw, has

tho impudence to compare onr people with the savages of Germany and our soldiers with the blackguards of tha Gorman army, tliev will be in a position to toll him frankly what lie really is."