The Churchill Series - Jan. 27, 2006

(One of a series of daily posts on the life of Winston S. Churchill.)

It's an amusing exchange. I bet you know of it:

George Bernard Shaw telegrammed Winston Churchill just prior to the opening of his latest play: "Have reserved two tickets for first night. Come and bring a friend if you have one."

Churchill wired back, "Impossible to come to first night. Will come to second night, if you have one."

Amusing, yes, but I'm not sure it ever really happened. A number of reliable sources don't mention it, while most unreliable sources do.

But I do have confidence in what follows.

The cartoonist David Low said:

"Churchill is one of the few men I have met who... give me the impression of genius. Shaw is another. It is amusing to know that each thinks the other is much overrated!"

By October, 1950 Shaw and Churchill would no doubt have agreed that the public was low rating them both. Shaw was then often ridiculed by critics while Churchill was struggling to regain enough public confidence to assure him a return to the Prime Minister's office.

In those circumstances, Churchill learned that Shaw had been hospitalized. He sent him flowers and a warm note. Shaw sent back a copy of his newest book, Sixteen Half Sketches, along with a note in which he said:

You need only read (a bit of it) as you and I are officially classed as ignoramuses."

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For the Low quote see The Churchill Centre, Contemporaries. (Here and scroll down)

For the exchange of notes ending with "ignoramuses" see Randolph S. Churchill, Winston S. Churhcill: Young Stateman. (p. 1)