Tuesday, May 29, 2012

George Bernard Shaw and Downton Abbey

POP1

In the TV series Downton Abbey a maid employed at the abbey gets herself pregnant by an army major who is convalescing there after injuries received in the War.  He returns to the front and is killed.  The maid contacts his parents with the news that they have a grandchild.  They wish to pay her for the child on condition that she have no contact with the child.  She rejects their offer.  George Bernard Shaw would have approved.  He seems to have  a low opinion of the parenting skills of the upper classes as evidenced by this letter, dated April 10, 1929.  It  can be seen at Bookman's Alley bookstore in Evanston, Illinois.





POP2

This is what it says:

'If this case is genuine what difficulty does it present?  The girl is lucky enough to have a healthy baby.  She is ignorant enough to think that it would be for the baby's good to sell it into "a wealthy home where it would be loved as  an only child and petted and cared for and given every chance".  She evidently knows nothing of such unfortunate children.  The silly people who are giving her unnatural advice to throw her treasure away would be the first to recoil from her if she took it.  Her omission to provide the child with a legitimate father is pardonable: but she would never be forgiven - nor forgive herself - if she sold it to a rich woman.  If she really feels unfit to be a mother let her present it to a capable woman as poor as herself if she can find one willing.'

G. Bernard Shaw

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