(no subject)
A week now. Watching the news, reading accounts like Luminosity's by people whose city New Orleans is, anything I could say feels pathetic and falling short. So I'll borrow a letter George Bernard Shaw wrote on January 7th, 1918, to Stella Patrick Campbell, whom he was in love with, when he heard that her only son had been killed in action.
Never saw it nor heard about it until your letter came. It is no use: I cant be sympathetic, these things simply make me furious. I want to swear. I do swear. Killed just because people are blasted fools. A chaplain, too, to say nice things about it. It is not his business to say nice things about it, but to shout that "the voice of thy son's blood crieth unto God from the ground."
No, dont show me the letter. But I should very much like to have a nice talk with that dear Chaplain, that sweet sky-pilot, that...
No use going on like that, Stella. Wait for a week, and then I shall be very clever and broadminded again and have forgotten all about this. I shall be quite as nice as the Chaplain.
Oh damn, damn, damn, damn, damn, damn, damn, DAMN.
And oh, dear, dear, dear, dear, dear, dearest!
GBS
Never saw it nor heard about it until your letter came. It is no use: I cant be sympathetic, these things simply make me furious. I want to swear. I do swear. Killed just because people are blasted fools. A chaplain, too, to say nice things about it. It is not his business to say nice things about it, but to shout that "the voice of thy son's blood crieth unto God from the ground."
No, dont show me the letter. But I should very much like to have a nice talk with that dear Chaplain, that sweet sky-pilot, that...
No use going on like that, Stella. Wait for a week, and then I shall be very clever and broadminded again and have forgotten all about this. I shall be quite as nice as the Chaplain.
Oh damn, damn, damn, damn, damn, damn, damn, DAMN.
And oh, dear, dear, dear, dear, dear, dearest!
GBS