George Bernard Shaw a penn State Electronic Classics Series Publication

How War muzzles the Dramatic Poet
As for myself, why, it may be asked, did I not write two plays
about the war instead of two pamphlets on it? The answer is
significant. You cannot make war on war and on your neigh-
bor at the same time. War cannot bear the terrible castiga-
tion of comedy, the ruthless light of laughter that glares on
the stage. When men are heroically dying for their country,
it is not the time to show their lovers and wives and fathers
and mothers how they are being sacrificed to the blunders of
boobies, the cupidity of capitalists, the ambition of conquer-
ors, the electioneering of demagogues, the Pharisaism of pa-
triots, the lusts and lies and rancors and bloodthirsts that
love war because it opens their prison doors, and sets them
in the thrones of power and popularity. For unless these things
are mercilessly exposed they will hide under the mantle of

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the ideals on the stage just as they do in real life.
And though there may be better things to reveal, it may
not, and indeed cannot, be militarily expedient to reveal them
whilst the issue is still in the balance. Truth telling is not
compatible with the defence of the realm. We are just now
reading the revelations of our generals and admirals,
unmuzzled at last by the armistice. During the war, General
A, in his moving despatches from the field, told how Gen-
eral B had covered himself with deathless glory in such and
such a battle. He now tells us that General B came within an
ace of losing us the war by disobeying his orders on that
occasion, and fighting instead of running away as he ought
to have done. An excellent subject for comedy now that the
war is over, no doubt; but if General A had let this out at the
time, what would have been the effect on General B’s sol-
diers? And had the stage made known what the Prime Min-
ister and the Secretary of State for War who overruled Gen-
eral A thought of him, and what he thought of them, as now
revealed in raging controversy, what would have been the
effect on the nation? That is why comedy, though sorely
tempted, had to be loyally silent; for the art of the dramatic
poet knows no patriotism; recognizes no obligation but truth
to natural history; cares not whether Germany or England
perish; is ready to cry with Brynhild, “Lass’uns verderben,
lachend zu grunde geh’n” sooner than deceive or be deceived;
and thus becomes in time of war a greater military danger
than poison, steel, or trinitrotoluene. That is why I had to
withhold Heartbreak House from the footlights during the
war; for the Germans might on any night have turned the
last act from play into earnest, and even then might not have
waited for their cues.
June, 1919.

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Heartbreak House
HEARTBREAK HOUSE
ACT I
The hilly country in the middle of the north edge of Sussex,
looking very pleasant on a fine evening at the end of Sep-
tember, is seen through the windows of a room which has
been built so as to resemble the after part of an old-fash-
ioned high-pooped ship, with a stern gallery; for the win-
dows are ship built with heavy timbering, and run right across
the room as continuously as the stability of the wall allows.
A row of lockers under the windows provides an
unupholstered windowseat interrupted by twin glass doors,
respectively halfway between the stern post and the sides.
Another door strains the illusion a little by being apparently
in the ship’s port side, and yet leading, not to the open sea,
but to the entrance hall of the house. Between this door and
the stern gallery are bookshelves. There are electric light
switches beside the door leading to the hall and the glass
doors in the stern gallery. Against the starboard wall is a
carpenter’s bench. The vice has a board in its jaws; and the
floor is littered with shavings, overflowing from a waste-pa-
per basket. A couple of planes and a centrebit are on the
bench. In the same wall, between the bench and the win-
dows, is a narrow doorway with a half door, above which a
glimpse of the room beyond shows that it is a shelved pantry
with bottles and kitchen crockery.
On the starboard side, but close to the middle, is a plain
oak drawing-table with drawing-board, T-square, straight-
edges, set squares, mathematical instruments, saucers of wa-
ter color, a tumbler of discolored water, Indian ink, pencils,
and brushes on it. The drawing-board is set so that the
draughtsman’s chair has the window on its left hand. On the
floor at the end of the table, on its right, is a ship’s fire bucket.
On the port side of the room, near the bookshelves, is a sofa
with its back to the windows. It is a sturdy mahogany article,
oddly upholstered in sailcloth, including the bolster, with a
couple of blankets hanging over the back. Between the sofa
and the drawing-table is a big wicker chair, with broad arms
and a low sloping back, with its back to the light. A small
but stout table of teak, with a round top and gate legs, stands
against the port wall between the door and the bookcase. It

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is the only article in the room that suggests (not at all con-
vincingly) a woman’s hand in the furnishing. The uncarpeted
floor of narrow boards is caulked and holystoned like a deck.
The garden to which the glass doors lead dips to the south
before the landscape rises again to the hills. Emerging from
the hollow is the cupola of an observatory. Between the ob-
servatory and the house is a flagstaff on a little esplanade,
with a hammock on the east side and a long garden seat on
the west.
A young lady, gloved and hatted, with a dust coat on, is
sitting in the window-seat with her body twisted to enable
her to look out at the view. One hand props her chin: the
other hangs down with a volume of the Temple Shakespeare
in it, and her finger stuck in the page she has been reading.
A clock strikes six.
The young lady turns and looks at her watch. She rises with
an air of one who waits, and is almost at the end of her patience.
She is a pretty girl, slender, fair, and intelligent looking, nicely
but not expensively dressed, evidently not a smart idler.
With a sigh of weary resignation she comes to the
draughtsman’s chair; sits down; and begins to read
Shakespeare. Presently the book sinks to her lap; her eyes
close; and she dozes into a slumber.
An elderly womanservant comes in from the hall with three
unopened bottles of rum on a tray. She passes through and
disappears in the pantry without noticing the young lady.
She places the bottles on the shelf and fills her tray with
empty bottles. As she returns with these, the young lady lets
her book drop, awakening herself, and startling the
womanservant so that she all but lets the tray fall.
THE WOMANSERVANT
. God bless us! [The young lady