Androcles and the Lion
3.5/5
()
About this ebook
George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) was born into a lower-class family in Dublin, Ireland. During his childhood, he developed a love for the arts, especially music and literature. As a young man, he moved to London and found occasional work as a ghostwriter and pianist. Yet, his early literary career was littered with constant rejection. It wasn’t until 1885 that he’d find steady work as a journalist. He continued writing plays and had his first commercial success with Arms and the Man in 1894. This opened the door for other notable works like The Doctor's Dilemma and Caesar and Cleopatra.
Read more from George Bernard Shaw
Mrs. Warren's Profession Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Major Barbara Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Bernard Shaw on Religion Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSaint Joan: A Play Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Misalliance Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Collected Works of George Bernard Shaw: Plays, Novels, Articles, Letters and Essays: Pygmalion, Mrs. Warren's Profession, Candida, Arms and The Man, Man and Superman, Caesar and Cleopatra, Androcles And The Lion, The New York Times Articles on War, Memories of Oscar Wilde and more Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGeorge Bernard Shaw - A Selection of One-Act Plays Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Crime of Imprisonment Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Man and Superman Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Caesar and Cleopatra Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsJohn Bull's Other Island Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Philanderer Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Candida Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Devil's Disciple Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Perfect Wagnerite Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHeartbreak House Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBernard Shaw on Literature Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsYou Never Can Tell Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Doctor's Dilemma Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bernard Shaw on Theater Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTHE COLLECTED WORKS OF GEORGE BERNARD SHAW: Pygmalion, Candida, Arms and The Man, Man and Superman, Caesar and Cleopatra… Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Complete Works of George Bernard Shaw Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBernard Shaw on Politics Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBack to Methuselah: A Metabiological Pentateuch Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Great Catherine: Whom Glory Still Adores Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Fanny's First Play Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Saint Joan Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related to Androcles and the Lion
Related ebooks
Goldie’s Lox And The Three Bagels: Fractured Jewish Fairy Tales Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Aesop's Fables Translated by George Fyler Townsend Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Aesop's Fables Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lonely Heart Of The Little Prince Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Blue Poetry Book Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTenacity in Children: Nurturing the Seven Instincts for Lifetime Success Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsErased Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Beowulf: A Verse Adaptation With Young Readers In Mind Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSelection of Short Stories by Teens for Teens: Volume 2 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsClassic Stories of O. Henry: Hand picked 9 popular stories out of 381 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAesop's Fables; a new translation Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLittle Women Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Study Guide for Andre Dubus's "Killings" Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsReady Reference Treatise: Mother Courage and Her Children Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAndrocles and the Lion Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Androcles and the Lion Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAndrocles and the Lion: "Youth is wasted on the young." Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBetrayed: The Riddled Stone, #3 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsArresting: Author's Selection Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlind Devotion (The Shifter Chronicles 3) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Last Werewolf Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Laughter & Pain Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFeral Tenderness Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGift of the Desert Dog Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Abolitionist Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRussian Bear Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Peacock Throne Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Episode 7: Ambush Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Spirits of a Lesser God: With a blink, a wink and a nod Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFeral Tenderness: Poetry And Photography Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Classics For You
The Princess Bride: S. Morgenstern's Classic Tale of True Love and High Adventure Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Hell House: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Fellowship Of The Ring: Being the First Part of The Lord of the Rings Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Bell Jar: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Animal Farm: A Fairy Story Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Rebecca Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Odyssey: (The Stephen Mitchell Translation) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Sense and Sensibility (Centaur Classics) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Heroes: The Greek Myths Reimagined Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Learn French! Apprends l'Anglais! THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY: In French and English Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Scarlet Letter Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Flowers for Algernon Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Old Man and the Sea: The Hemingway Library Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5East of Eden Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Murder of Roger Ackroyd Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Silmarillion Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Things They Carried Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Sun Also Rises: The Hemingway Library Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Persuasion Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Republic by Plato Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Confederacy of Dunces Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5As I Lay Dying Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Iliad (The Samuel Butler Prose Translation) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5For Whom the Bell Tolls: The Hemingway Library Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Lathe Of Heaven Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Farewell to Arms Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Good Man Is Hard To Find And Other Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Titus Groan Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Wuthering Heights (with an Introduction by Mary Augusta Ward) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Count of Monte Cristo (abridged) (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Androcles and the Lion
59 ratings4 reviews
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Shaw's bombast gets in the way of the play. He was really so full of himself that he could write a pedantic 100 page preface to a 42 page play? Even after the play is over Shaw appends another ten pages of lecture, just in case you fell asleep or skipped through the first hundred pages.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This play, set in Imperial Rome, is the story of a Christian being thrown to the lions. However, the play is a lot more than just a poor defenceless soul being ripped apart by a ravenous beast, nor is it an attack upon Christianity, but rather a critical look at the church in modern times. The intention of the play seems to be to remind Christians of where they have come from and what they have become.The play was released in 1913, during a time when the Church still had a significant influence over society, though it was beginning to face attacks from scientific rationalism and modernism. It was the eve of World War I: a war in which both sides claimed divine support which resulted in one of the bloodiest wars humanity had experienced. However this relates more to the time in which the play was written rather than the play itself because at the time nobody actually believed that they were on the brink of war.The book in which the play was published contains one of Shaw's characteristic prologues, and in fact the prologue to this play is longer than the play itself. In this prologue Shaw examines each of the gospels and concludes that Jesus was an exceptional man who had a lot to say regarding the way humans lived. However it is clear that he did not accept Christ's divinity, nor does he accept the resurrection but rather he believes that the true teachings of Christ were lost with the crucifixion and where then manipulated by the early apostles, with a particular focus on Paul, for their own purposes. What Shaw does not realise was that Paul, up until his conversion, was a very devout Jew who went around persecuting Christians. Paul was not the type of person to have radically changed his beliefs without some form of epiphany upon which there was some factual basis.The play is based on an earlier story where the hero, Androcles, runs away from his master and hides in a cave where he meets a lion. He removes a thorn from the Lion's foot and bandages it and as a result the lion becomes his friend. Years later Androcles returns to Rome, is arrested as a runaway slave, and thrown to the lions. It turns out that the lion in the arena is the same lion that Androcles helped in the past and as a result the lion does not attack him: thus Androcles is spared.Shaw uses this tale as a vehicle for his philosophy and analyses true religious values: which he believes is earnestness and lack of hypocrisy. While the lack of hypocrisy is important, and Jesus has much to say to the hypocrites of his day, the earnestness is not clearly something that is helpful. The key to Christianity is faith is an objective truth. It is all well and good to have faith, but if one has faith in something that is not true, then that faith comes to nothing. A great example is of an aeroplane. We may get onto the plane convinced that the plane will take us where we want to go, but no amount of faith is going to stop the plane's engines from exploding if there is a fault in those engines. Simply ask somebody who has survived a plane crash.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Shaw uses the framework of Aesop's tale of Androcles and the lion to examine how different people exhibit (or fail to exhibit) Christian virtues. In particular importance in the play is the Christian ideal of turning the other cheek. There were many ideas similar to those in "The Devil's Disciple" but as a play I think that this one isn't as good entertainment as "The Devil's Disciple" was.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5A fun little work, short and to the point, based on the old fable, but with more wisecracking and dialogue. Shaw does not go out of his way to make any side of this look good, and Androcles himself is a wimpy sort of guy, lacking in any real courage except where animals are concerned. The Christians are not the bad guys, but neither are the pagans. They are all just sort of strange, with odd beliefs that at least some of them are willing to die for. Shaw skewers everyone equally, but there is a gentleness to his fun, and many of the characters are actually likeable. This was worth the time I spent.
Book preview
Androcles and the Lion - George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw
Androcles
and the Lion
Published by Sovereign
This edition first published in 2018
Copyright © 2018 Sovereign
All Rights Reserve
ISBN: 9781787247857
Contents
PROLOGUE
ACT I
ACT II
PROLOGUE
Overture; forest sounds, roaring of lions, Christian hymn faintly.
A jungle path. A lion’s roar, a melancholy suffering roar, comes from the jungle. It is repeated nearer. The lion limps from the jungle on three legs, holding up his right forepaw, in which a huge thorn sticks. He sits down and contemplates it. He licks it. He shakes it. He tries to extract it by scraping it along the ground, and hurts himself worse. He roars piteously. He licks it again. Tears drop from his eyes. He limps painfully off the path and lies down under the trees, exhausted with pain. Heaving a long sigh, like wind in a trombone, he goes to sleep.
Androcles and his wife Megaera come along the path. He is a small, thin, ridiculous little man who might be any age from thirty to fifty-five. He has sandy hair, watery compassionate blue eyes, sensitive nostrils, and a very presentable forehead; but his good points go no further; his arms and legs and back, though wiry of their kind, look shrivelled and starved. He carries a big bundle, is very poorly clad, and seems tired and hungry.
His wife is a rather handsome pampered slattern, well fed and in the prime of life. She has nothing to carry, and has a stout stick to help her along.
MEGAERA (suddenly throwing down her stick) I won’t go another step.
ANDROCLES (pleading wearily) Oh, not again, dear. What’s the good of stopping every two miles and saying you won’t go another step? We must get on to the next village before night. There are wild beasts in this wood: lions, they say.
MEGAERA. I don’t believe a word of it. You are always threatening me with wild beasts to make me walk the very soul out of my body when I can hardly drag one foot before another. We haven’t seen a single lion yet.
ANDROCLES. Well, dear, do you want to see one?
MEGAERA (tearing the bundle from his back) You cruel beast, you don’t care how tired I am, or what becomes of me (she throws the bundle on the ground): always thinking of yourself. Self! self! self! always yourself! (She sits down on the bundle).
ANDROCLES (sitting down sadly on the ground with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands) We all have to think of ourselves occasionally, dear.
MEGAERA. A man ought to think of his wife sometimes.
ANDROCLES. He can’t always help it, dear. You make me think of you a good deal. Not that I blame you.
MEGAERA. Blame me! I should think not indeed. Is it my fault that I’m married to you?
ANDROCLES. No, dear: that is my fault.
MEGAERA. That’s a nice thing to say to me. Aren’t you happy with me?
ANDROCLES. I don’t complain, my love.
MEGAERA. You ought to be ashamed of yourself.
ANDROCLES. I am, my dear.
MEGAERA. You’re not: you glory in it.
ANDROCLES. In what, darling?
MEGAERA. In everything. In making me a slave, and making yourself a laughing-stock. Its not fair. You get me the name of being a shrew with your meek ways, always talking as if butter wouldn’t melt in your mouth. And just because I look a big strong woman, and because I’m good-hearted and a bit hasty, and because you’re always driving me to do things I’m sorry for afterwards, people say Poor man: what a life his wife leads him!
Oh, if they only knew! And you think I don’t know. But I do, I do, (screaming) I do.
ANDROCLES. Yes, my dear: I know you do.
MEGAERA. Then why don’t you treat me properly and be a good husband to me?
ANDROCLES. What can I do, my dear?
MEGAERA. What can you do! You can return to your duty, and come back to your home and your friends, and sacrifice to the gods as all respectable people do, instead of having us hunted out of house and home for being dirty, disreputable, blaspheming atheists.
ANDROCLES. I’m not an atheist, dear: I am a Christian.
MEGAERA. Well, isn’t that the same thing, only ten times worse? Everybody knows that the Christians are the very lowest of the low.
ANDROCLES. Just like us, dear.
MEGAERA. Speak for yourself. Don’t you dare to compare me to common people. My father owned his own public-house; and sorrowful was the day for me when you first came drinking in our bar.
ANDROCLES. I confess I was addicted to it, dear.