Shakespeare in Max Beerbohm’s Theatre Criticism

Summary

In May 1898 Bernard Shaw gave up his post of theatre critic of The Saturday Review. He was ill. His doctor, he explained, had discovered that ‘for many years [he had] been converting the entire stock of energy extractable from [his] food . . . into pure genius’. He was ‘already almost an angel’, and would complete the process if he wrote any more articles. So, on 21 May, he wrote an essay headed ‘Valedictory’. He cannot justify the fact that he has spent four years on dramatic criticism. He has

sworn an oath to endure no more of it. . . . Still, the gaiety of nations must not be eclipsed. The long string of beautiful ladies who are at present in the square without, awaiting, under the supervision of two gallant policemen, their turn at my bedside, must be reassured when they protest, as they will, that the light of their life will go out if my dramatic articles cease. To each of them I will present the flower left by her predecessor, and assure her that there are as good fish in the sea as ever came out of it. The younger generation is knocking at the door; and as I open it there steps spritely in the incomparable Max.