Word: shaw
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1930-1939
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Britain's individualistic literati carried on a violent, open discussion in the newspapers on peace v. war. Most outspoken and extreme was incorrigible Playwright George Bernard Shaw, who wrote an unsolicited (and unpaid for) letter to the Manchester Guardian which plugged this way for peace...
Later, would-be Peacemaker Shaw, asked by London's Daily Worker, Communist organ, whether he favored peace negotiations and an immediate armistice, answered: "I'm in favor of negotiations . . . but a philosopher-or a God-might hold that, as the 1914-1918 war was well worth while because it got rid of the German, Austrian, Turkish and Russian Empires, this one might be worthwhile if it got rid of the British Empire: not a very pleasant process for us. . . . But the sooner the order is given to cease fire and turn up the lights the better...
...Disagreeing with Playwright Shaw was Biologist Julian Huxley, who chose the London Times as his forum: "We cannot survive as a great power unless we smash Hitlerism; but if we are to prevent the growth of a new Hitlerism later, we must plan some kind of new international order." Scientist J. B. S. Haldane, who as a rule has fairly fresh ideas, wanted: 1) peace negotiations now; 2) an arrangement for "all peoples to be allowed free elections to determine their own form of government," a faithful echo of 1919 Wilsonian self-determinism...
Meanwhile Willie Gallacher, lone Communist M.P., suddenly dropped his bellicose anti-Hitler baiting and became, along with Shaw, Sir Oswald Mosley, Haldane and Lloyd George, a plugger for peace. By last week London's Daily Worker had obviously re-established its pipeline to Moscow and instead of wild conjectures about the new Party line, was again dishing out the straight official Comintern dope. It front-paged an editorial about "imperialist statesmen" still "bargaining hard," continued...
World War II began by borrowing one of the theatre's best-known devices-the blackout. Blacked out along with everything else were the theatres themselves. But not for long. London, Paris, Berlin hungered for amusement; already during the first week of the war George Bernard Shaw, Margot, Countess of Oxford and Asquith, many another, protested against the "stupidity" of closing the theatres. With a curfew law blotting out London's West End, producers rushed shows to the suburbs. In Berlin, once air-raid precautions were arranged, theatres reopened full blast. If the war runs...