Augustus Does His Bit:-
Only
Mr. Shaw could do this - live during harrowing, exciting, uncertain
times when future seemed brilliant one moment and bleak another, when a
huge war was complicated by a revolution in a huge, huge nations
sprawled across eastern half of Europe and all of north Asia, when
kingdoms fell down and royal families were assassinated and aristocrats
fled their homes and countries and lived lives of penury in greatly
strained circumstances and still tried to maintain their haughty
demeanor, when middle and upper classes were uncertain if their own
servants would rise up and slay them all over when asleep, and colonial
rules were beginning to totter with independence movements gaining
momentum - only he could live through all this, and take a look at it
with a seemingly close focus and paint a seemingly sarcastic, ridiculing
portrait of his own side, and yet come out making a reader and a viewer
adoring the very people we were all laughing at a moment ago.
The
short play is set in the battlefield of the first world war somewhere
in the background, with a typical slightly dense upper- upper middle
class Augustus attempting to do his best for his nation, saying all the
right things with complete sincerity and yet be naive enough to be
fooled by a woman of upper class who has arrived to spy, to take away
important papers that lie openly on his desk in the belief that everyone
shall be British and play cricket, and not lie or spy while looking
like a lady or a gentleman.
But it is all right after
all - she is merely there to win a bet with his boss, which she does
very easily, and leaves the bumbling Englishman to take care of the
affairs pretty much representative of his ilk, his nation - and to do
all right after all.
Wednesday, February 26, 2014.
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Androcles and the Lion:-
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Annajanska, the Bolshevik Empress:-
A
comedy look at the revolution where instead of the gore and massacres
of real events there is a princess of the realm travelling dressed up as
an officer of the military, which leads people to conclude she is
kidnapped by the officer; what she intends is to take over the
revolution, and since the various people now serving the revolution and
attempting to adapt to the new order of the day of everyone supposedly
being equal are at heart still very much devoted to her, there is every
chance she will succeed, and so become the Bolshevik Empress.
January 21, 2014.
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Arms and the Man:-
What
seems obvious might after all not be so, and those that are seemingly
snobbish and haughty might be not as affluent after all as those that
seem casual or even comic. those that speak of love and are rewarded for
their bravery might have never experienced either.
And
then there is Switzerland, the beautiful land with snow and meadows and
chocolate and cheese, and contradictions - a country that never fought a
war in recent history but has always hired out mercenaries to every
nation.
September 10, 2008.
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Caesar And Cleopatra:-
Here
is a fresh look at Cleopatra as the young girl she must have been,
compared to the much older Caesar - and while it is delightful in seeing
a petulant young pretty girl getting her education rather expensively,
through life and war, it is also a scathing commentary on various issues
around war and morality and dealing with enemy, with Caesar above his
fellow men - and women - providing them insight about why it was wrong
what they did wrong.
Most delightful remains the prologue, a monologue by the Egyptian god Ra, addressing the audience disdainfully.
A sample - "O you compulsorily educated people!"
Monday, September 22, 2008.
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Candida:-
Revolutionary,
as much else by Mr. Shaw, this work, about a luminous woman with her
own mind and strength and wisdom - perhaps much like your wife or
mother, at that - and entirely worthy of more than reading. About love
and truth about love, and about marriage. About strength, and about
one's responsibility.
Once it was understood without
hypocrisy that a man looked for a wife who could make a home for him,
and a woman had to make the best possible choice at every moment, either
gambling on getting a better offer, or taking the best she had, in
marrying a man who could provide for the home she would make. Few were
lucky to find lvoe as well, at the same time - most did the best they
could, and things have not changed in this respect, only there is more
hypocrisy in name of love.
Love is not so easy to either find or chooose or live with.
Love
might very well be a man too young to provide a family for the woman
whom he fell in love with - she might be married, with a family, if she
is lucky, not still waiting and dispirited. Will she then choose him? Or
will consevative values win and she advise the younger man, the lover,
to go find soemone appropriate?
If she does, it might
just be that she has wisdom and courage to name the real reasons for her
decision, and explain them. A woman - a wife and mother, in potential
and instinct even when not de facto - chooses the weaker one, to care
for and to protect with all she has to give, which is love and care and
understanding and more.
A scrawny young poet, and a respected much loved minister, who does the woman choose? Or does she have to choose between them?
Monday, September 22, 2008.
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Captain Brassbound's Conversion:-
For
a long time this was a very favourite play and that merely means when
you have lived so much more and read as well, other works add to the
favourite lists.
It is an amazing play, beginning with
what might be - or should be - a common fear in minds of all colonial
masters traveling in parts they misruled once; a bandit capturing and
kidnapping a small party of travellers and promising to sell the lord of
the group to a dreaded ruler for beheading after a few games.
And
from this dreadful start, it then proceeds into a delightful play, with
one pompous man (the ex colonial ruler sort, naturally) brought down by
one of his own party - his sister-in-law, and the bandit outsmarted by
her kind and sympathetic but shrewd dealing with the situation, so he
comes out looking like a hero who saved them, in fact.
One
of the lines - "it becomes clear that an agitated man pacing furiously
cannot win against a woman knitting calmly" - of course this is as I
remember it after the few decades it has been since I read it yet again
for pleasure. He wrote it much better, of course.
Saturday, September 27, 2008.
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The Devil's Disciple:-
True
goodness need not be certified by a faith or an institution that claims
sole rights to mediate with powers above and absolve people from sins.
Adhering to an institution of such nature does not guarantee goodness of
a person, and equally, one does not turn devil against one's own true
nature simply by rebelling against such an institution,
When
it comes to it, a man of noble spirit goes with the soul, and never
mind his repudiation of institutions that claim rights to heaven.
Friday, February 21, 2014.
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The Doctor's Dilemma:-
When
it comes to a choice of only one patient you can save, who do you
choose - is it the rogue with an attractive wife, or a sincere poor
colleague who did much good and helped the poor and has no money left?
Sunday, September 21, 2008.
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Fanny's First Play:-
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Getting Married:-
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Great Catherine:-
Shaw
is no worshiper of great persona of history, and The Great Catherine of
Russia does not escape his caricature. She is shown here as a barbaric
ruler of a barbaric huge powerful nation, charmed by sophistication of a
mere lowly officer of the British embassy in her empire.
Every
caricature has some truth distorted, and here the fact is Russia was
and is a huge nation spreading from eastern one third of Europe to the
very eastern edge of Asia, and as a matter of fact Alaska belongs to US
only because the 99 year old lease was lost during the revolution. The
great wilderness of Siberia would be a nation large enough to be among
first ten if it were independent, and neighbouring Yakutia joins it in
the large wilderness of deep heart of Russia. So the populace is varied,
there are well over a dozen languages and many faiths. Uniting all this
is no joke, and the greater of the Russian monarchs did it by
commanding loyalty from their subjects as Catherine the Great did.
And
yes, they did look to west for bringing some sophistication to the vast
wilderness, and the court language was French, spoken even among
themselves by the upper class, often at home as well. That their heart
stays Russian can be no doubt, but they were no barbarians of this
caricature, post Peter the Great who built St Petersburg.
Thursday, January 23, 2014.
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How He Lied to Her Husband:-
I
seem to have lost a review of this play, a most favourite one, that I
remember - vividly - writing, only a few weeks ago about this play, and
while this is not the first time it has happened it is difficult to
think of how it could have.
This play is one of the
most delightful ones penned by the writer and it is completely unlike
anything anyone (outside old British social life) might imagine. One of
the most wonderful plays by Mr. Shaw, full of quite unexpected turns
when one is in the world of literature but quite normal in real life,
which is what makes it hilarious and sobering.
A very
talented and romantic poet who is in love with a beautiful woman, who
wishes nothing as much as seeing her every evening for a session of
theatre and dinner or at least reading poetry to her that is written for
her, in praise of her exquisite beauty, and is ever ready to do
anything his love might demand of him.
Only, she is
married, and to a very rich man who gives her everything she could wish
for materially and socially but is no romantic poet, or at any rate not a
man of words. On the other hand he is not stingy about providing her
with an expensive social lifestyle with dinners, parties, artists
invited and theatre and carriages, jewellery. And so on. Still, he is no
poet. Is he literate, is hard to remember from the play. Does he
appreciate her beauty more than in terms of his own pleasure, one doubts
to begin with.
There is the whole setting - the very
beautiful and wealthy Aurora who is married to a common businessman
although able to have a social life of consorting with various artists
and so forth.
And then the play begins to unfold. The
husband, the very practical and very much bourgois man who has provided
his wife with everything she could ever wish for in terms of wealth and
social life, has now rumoured to have found out about the poet and the
wife. Someone has told the husband about the poet's writing extensive
poetry every day about the wife, and the love (still platonic in fact)
that is the soil for the poetry to grow from, and so on. And the wife
has come to know about the husband having been informed, and she is
frantic in worry about what will happen.
The poet who
is in love with her, writing poems to her, willing to do anything for
her, whether taking her our to theatre every evening or stay in and
amuse her or be shot by her husband or elope with her, whatever destiny
might have in store for the love of his very exilarated heights of
romance. The poet is willing to do anything she wishes, while his own
noble instinct is to accept the blame and confront the husband with the
truth and walk off into the sunset with his beloved beautiful Aurora.
What
comes next is the typical Shaw sequence of twists and turns that leaves
one helpless in hilarious laughter while totally in sympathy with the
poor poet. I have no intention of spoiling the delight of reading
further by saying another word about what comes next, for those that
have not read this yet. Any attempt to describe it will spoil it for the
reader, so I shall desist.
Thursday, November 20, 2008.
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John Bull's Other Island:-
About
the other English speaking island in Europe and the relationship
between the two - England and Ireland, or rather Britain and Ireland;
about their perceptions of themselves vs their perceptions of one
another, and of matters of life and so forth in general. How English
perceive Ireland romantically and yet would exploit it and the Irish
people, how Irish would complain about the British but give them control
of the land easily, and how each thinks the other quaint and
ridiculous.
Perhaps it has occurred to others before,
but is it possible Ireland makes Britain safer and more livable, being
the buffer between Atlantic winds and waves and Britain, while Britain
is surrounded by the warm gulf stream?
Sunday, January 19, 2014.
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Major Barbara:-
A
delightful look at various prevalent notions and hypocrisies of the
times - and realities as they are. Salvation Army, church, politics as a
career, ethics of business; niceties of law that might make one
illegitimate in UK or at least in England but not in Australia, much
less anywhere else in the world; and inheritance vs competence, when it
is about running a business.
US, particularly NRA of US
(as in gun lobby) seem to have adopted the creed of one of the
characters in this to an extent that poor Mr. Shaw could never have
imagined - "seem to" being the key here. But on the other hand, who
knows, he would perhaps have said that neither NRA of US nor he were
wrong, and that any society that allows such happenings without curbing
them with laws that made sense and protected children perhaps deserved
the grief they allowed the arms manufacturers and dealers to let loose
on them. And really US has much that is legal in US but illegal in
Europe in many countries, or at least those that matter. Germany for
example has outlawed any organisations or pictures to do with their past
horror - but not US where those proliferate; so guns too, and the
consequent stupidity of innocent persons and your own children massacred
in their own homes and schools.
Gun lobby of US - and
much else of the world - might claim they follow this very intelligent
writer for ethics, but if you look at it with a scrutiny, actually, no
they don't; they are doing precisely what the writer cautions against,
that is, mixing politics and business - for example in deciding who they
will or will not sell to (or allow to carry arms), whether on personal
level in the country (men get license easily, women don't, even though
they are far more in need of self defence, whether from personal
attackers or home robbers and so on), or on global level about nations
and gangs (here there is no need of examples - they are far too obvious,
well known), therefore making it a mess - or at least helping politics
do so.
That said, this is of course an extremely
intelligent play as almost everything written by this writer is; this
one deals with an arms dealer and the possible social embarrassment his
family with aristocratic connections must go through - his son requires
that the father help him without allowing it to be known, since he needs
to have a social status - and various issues around the question,
morality vs. arms manufacturer.
Saturday, July 10, 2010.
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The Man of Destiny:-
Napoleon.
Friday, July 9, 2010.
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Misalliance:-
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O'Flaherty V.C.:-
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Overruled:-
A
couple in need of refreshing or rethinking a marriage in the
comparatively restricted era a century ago when divorce was possible but
socially not easy to live with, would likely take time away to think it
over. If they of reasonable means it could mean going around the world
on a pleasure cruise separately, and of course an earlier generation
might simply have arranged separate bedrooms or - if they were higher or
lower than middle class - have separate intimate lives with others
outside the marriage a la French (upper class? not necessarily), too.
But this era, beginning of open thinking and lives, and a bit more
honesty, would prompt them to more honest solutions towards saving the
marriage honestly or do whatever it is honestly.
Now
if George Bernard Shaw is going to consider this question he naturally
comes up with two couples that have gone their separate ways around the
world and have not only come across one half of the other each but
fallen in love, and to throw in more fun they have very different
attitudes. One falls in love desperately but is shocked at the beloved
wife of another takes it as not so difficult or immoral as long as they
don't do anything physical, and another has exactly the opposite
position.
Of course, post our first encounter with the
first pair of lovers in quandary of what if whether, soon the two
couples meet, the men discuss, and it is all funny if more
intellectually when reading, but competent performers (one can imagine
David Niven, Cary Grant, and women to match) might make audience roll in
aisles with pain due to laughter too.
Of course, real
life couples do not have so neat or happy solutions, there is far more
pain and mess, but all the more reason to look to literature and its
more visual experiences of theater and film and now television for some
relief, some smiles, laughter, and forgetting of pains. In this as ever
Shaw succeeds albeit with a bit more intellectual level than say Jeeves,
or perhaps one might compare them on par, but this one certainly could
serve the purpose.
Monday, February 24, 2014.
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Pygmalion:-
This
is the original play that the very famous and popular "My fair Lady" is
based on, except that was more of a sweet version, and this retains the
original English, perhaps British or even Irish, taste - not sweet, not
sour, not bitter or hot, but a little salt and some of that sixth taste
that is called "kasaila" or "kashaaya" which means tea in the old
medicinal sense.
Here at the end there is a very well
written epilogue that explains why the professor does not propose to any
woman or have any romantic affair with any woman (and certainly with no
man either) - not as a sickness on his part, but as a matter of
evolution, and he is very evolved indeed.
Unlike US of
today the social norms of Britain then were quite different and sex was
not a compulsory activity to prove one was normal, and for that matter
normal was never defined as average, either.
So
eccentricity was not only allowed it positively thrived and flourished,
and benefited the society enormously. Men like the professor could
devote their time and energy to their preferred pursuits. He does end up
baffled and quite unable to escape Elizabeth Dolittle though.
Friday, July 9, 2010.
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The Inca of Perusalem:-
Shaw
lived and wrote during times of great turbulence of more than world
scale, of scale of history as well as world. Feudal era passing and
ideas of equality of all humans (- then they said men, forgetting women
are not always included, so almost a foot behind women followed with
demands and questions re their equal rights, fought in most western
nations with great rigorous opposition from men and often women who saw
their privileges in riding on men's coattails slipping away if they had
to be independent -) not only being put forth but seeming to take root,
flourish, fly, and already establish in various places, with great
revolutions needed to bring them to fore taking place in others.
So
he wrote of things to come, things being thought and discussed, things
seeming to come true, and human follies and natures and interactions
making the live tragedies and horrors seem not only bearable but funny
and hilarious, as often they must have been. Inca Of Perusalem is one
such play.
The princess of the realm is modest and
unable to insist on being treated with the due respect she ought to be
paid by average and avaricious hotel managers, and it takes a smart and
formidable young woman to set things right, so of course the princess
cannot help employing her albeit she is a bit scared of the new maid.
Then there is the question of the Inca who has sent a proposal to the
princess on behalf of his son, and an emissary to meet her, in reality
to inspect her to see if she is fit to be queen some day.
Only
of course, as the readers know by now being accustomed to the device a
century after such authors set the precedent, the emissary is Inca
incognito and the young woman he meets and is browbeaten by and smitten
by is the maid. Both however are smart, so everything turns out fine.
Meanwhile the readers - and audience in theater if that is how one comes
across this - have had fun.
Monday, February 24, 2014.
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The Philanderer:-
Women
- and too, enlightened men - were in favour of women's education,
property and voting rights, enfranchisement, suffragists demanding and
chaining themselves. many identified these movements with left for
obvious reasons - it seemed against interest of any conservatives to
lose any source of free labour, and women just as slaves or colonial
possessions were source of it.
But most people also
misuderstood women's liberty and freedom first and foremost in the
wrongest possible direction - one that would actually benefit men. Some
people saw it coming and they were not all against women's rights - and
Mr. Shaw was one such man.
With women free, and access
to women granted freely to any man, those that had no honourable
intentions were in heaven. They could play with women's hearts and
discard them - all in name of women's freedom, since the
misunderstanding was, it was about no chaperone watching over to make
sure their real important rights were guarded - those related to just
such men not destroying hearts and lives.
This is the
story of just such a woman who has a heart and would hide it behind talk
of freedom, so she can try to attract one playing with her heart, her
subsequent - or even, consequent - heartbreak when it is clear he never
had any intention that could be then called honourable (now the word has
gone out of usage, almost), and the philanderer who nevertheless sees
what havoc he has wreaked, with clear eyes.
Monday, September 22, 2008.
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The Shewing-Up Of Blanco Posnet:-
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You Never Can Tell:-
Often
when one lets it go, rather than pursue the question, the answer
quietly steals into awareness, and so it happened with this play. It
took some time to try to remember what this title was related to - I was
sure I had read and liked it, but no clue of any sort of a connection
to a story from the title in memory. Until suddenly I remembered a play,
and I think this is the one.
If I am right this is
about the unexpected reconciliation of a family of an emancipated woman
who took away her children when the husband - their father - whipping
the eldest one, a little girl, was an immediate prospect.
The
reconciliation happens when the eldest is a grown up young woman on
verge of womanhood who is unsure of herself, and the other daughter a
cheeky self confident youngster who has no qualms about putting any
adult off balance with her astute observations, which the brother
achieves in other ways.
Much hilarity, heartwarming
and sometimes a little heartbreaking ensues while the unexpected
encounter, subsequent meetings and very carefully arranged
reconciliation happens.
For a special Shaw touch, there is the waiter, everyone's beloved confidante, who has a son at the bar.
Come
to think of it the name is entirely apt - how could this play have any
other name?!! Unless it was something as prosaic and yet uncommon as
Sophronia's Family.
Wednesday, November 5, 2008.
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Mrs. Warren's Profession:-
Age
old dilemma of society - "respectable"vs. the other side, and the need
of one for the other. It must have of course been extremely
controversial when it was written - and published - but this writer was
always more than equal to any criticism and could always argue either
side of a debate with reason.
This one is not a comedy, though, and one is presented with Mrs. Warren's side quite reasonably.
Wednesday, September 10, 2008.
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