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Oh Pshaw!

There have been few productions of George Bernard Shaw plays in the last decade. He's currently at the Sheryl and Harvey White Theatre in Educating Shaw, a play about his unconventional courtship of Charlotte Payne-Townshend.

Some favorite quotations from the Old Curmudgeon:

"Success does not consist in never making mistakes, but in never making the same one a second time."

"If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance."

"When a thing is funny, search it carefully for a hidden truth."

Apropos of these times: "A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul."

"Why should we take advice on sex from the Pope? If he knows anything about it, he shouldn't!"

"All great truths begin as blasphemies."

"I'm sorry this letter is so long. I didn't have time to make it shorter."

A Native American elder described his own inner struggles in this manner: 'Inside of me are two dogs. One of the dogs is mean and evil. The other dog is good. The mean dog fights the good dog all the time.' When asked which dog wins, [the elder] reflected for a moment and replied, 'the one I feed the most.'

"Without art, the crudeness of reality would make the world unbearable."

"You see things; you say, 'Why?' But I dream of things that never were and say 'Why not?'"

A postscript:

Shaw (to Winston Churchill): "I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my new play. Bring a friend...if you have one.'

Churchill: "Cannot possibly attend first night. Will attend second, if there is one."

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Two poems by Marvin Bell

“To Dorothy” and “The Self and the Mulberry”

There have been few productions of George Bernard Shaw plays in the last decade. He's currently at the Sheryl and Harvey White Theatre in Educating Shaw, a play about his unconventional courtship of Charlotte Payne-Townshend.

Some favorite quotations from the Old Curmudgeon:

"Success does not consist in never making mistakes, but in never making the same one a second time."

"If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance."

"When a thing is funny, search it carefully for a hidden truth."

Apropos of these times: "A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul."

"Why should we take advice on sex from the Pope? If he knows anything about it, he shouldn't!"

"All great truths begin as blasphemies."

"I'm sorry this letter is so long. I didn't have time to make it shorter."

A Native American elder described his own inner struggles in this manner: 'Inside of me are two dogs. One of the dogs is mean and evil. The other dog is good. The mean dog fights the good dog all the time.' When asked which dog wins, [the elder] reflected for a moment and replied, 'the one I feed the most.'

"Without art, the crudeness of reality would make the world unbearable."

"You see things; you say, 'Why?' But I dream of things that never were and say 'Why not?'"

A postscript:

Shaw (to Winston Churchill): "I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my new play. Bring a friend...if you have one.'

Churchill: "Cannot possibly attend first night. Will attend second, if there is one."

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