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Reprint: Interview with George Bernard Shaw, by Johannes Steel, July 19, 1948.
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INTERVIEW WITH GEORGE BERNARD SHALL London, July 19, 1948 By Johannes Steel
Ninety-one year old George Bernard Shaw, grand old man of English letters, believes that "a war between the United States and the Soviet Union would ruin both countries;"...that "Stalin is a great statesman;"...that "Bevin is just like Bismarck;"...that "the Jews must fight it out in Palestine;"...that "Henry Agard Wallace is the only American political figure today who knows what it is all about and the only one among the presidential candidates who represents progress..."
These and many other equally emphatic statements were made by Shaw in an interview with this correspondent in the charming sittingroom of his home "Shaw's Corners" in the village of Ayot St. Lawrence, Welwyn, Hertfordshire.
As a rule Shaw never permits himself to be interviewed unless, as he told me with a real twinkle in his merry Irish eyes"...he brings a check for $50,000...have you, sir, brought a check for $50,000?..."He talked practically uninterruptedly for well over an hour, on subjects ranging from politics and history, to art and science, to morals and manners. He talked with precision, articulating with deliberate emphasis each and every sentence he spoke. It was a great experience to listen to this very young "old man" who, in his own words, remembers "the news of Lincoln's shooting as 'coming quite late in my life'..."
However, far from living in the past, Shaw is more interested in the future, and is extremely well-informed about the world of today. When I asked him what he thought of the Republican presi-dential candidate, Thomas E. Dewey, his answer was short. "I don't, sir, I don't think about Mr. Dewey. I never met the man..." And before I could ask him about the other candidates, he went on, "it doesn't make any difference, it's all the same. Democrat or Republican...represent the same... Wallace is the man...tell the American people that Shaw says Wallace is the only one among the candidates who is a social philosopher...the only man who can do something about the international situation because he knows something about it...the moment Wallace announced he would stand I said there is my man... tell the American people I repeat it...every single vote for Wallace is a vote for advance."