Dear students of First Year B.Com., we have recently finished reading ‘How I Became a Public Speaker’, a memoir by George Bernard Shaw, the great British/Irish playwright and thinker, narrating his ventures in the field of public speaking. We have already discussed some aspects of his life and personality at some length, but nothing can be better than to watch Shaw himself speaking. These are some of the videos of Shaw that I found on YouTube. Watch them and experience the razor-sharp tongue and even sharper wit (a typical Irish trait ) of this man who always took the world by storm with his unorthodox thoughts and of course, his fantastic literary and oratorical gifts.

This first video was filmed by Fox Movietone on 26th  August, 1928 when Shaw was on his first tour of America. He is just having a casual, plain hearty talk with the media-persons. He is surprised to see them and find himself in front of the camera all of a sudden. He’s just having fun, laughing at himself, making fun of the infamous Italian dictator Benitto Mussolini (who was then ruling Italy), having a go at the then prime minister of Britain, Lloyd-George- in other words, this is Shaw at his sarcastic best. Love him or hate him but you certainly can’t ignore him. I am giving below, a transcript of this video as uploaded on YouTube by the person who uploaded this video. Note that it contains some errors, but the major part of it is alright. For other videos, I couldn’t provide the transcript because I didn’t get them readymade and I had no time to create their transcripts because as Shaw says at the end of this video, “I’m afraid I’m always an extremely busy man – at least I pretend I am.” 🙂

Shaw says:
"Well, this is a surprise, have you all come to see me.. ladies and gentlemen? Well, I should never have expected this…. its extremely kind of you and I’m very glad to see you.You know, I’m very glad to have come as I like people to see me. I don’t know how it is, but people who only know me from reading my books or sometimes see my plays get an unpleasant impression of me.
And….the people who meet me as you’ve been kind enough to meet me, when they see that I’m a most harmless person, I’m really a most kindly person, you know.But…it’s not necessary for me to always look as genial as I’m trying to look now, of course I can put on the other thing. (COVERS FACE WITH HANDS and glows at camera)
Now, that is, that is what I call my "Mussolini" style, and by the way I think in justice to Signor Mussolini, I ought to tell you that he has a very wonderful head – a wonderful brow which comes down to here. But the difficulty is that he can’t take it off…now if you watch me, I can put on that imposing look which terrifies you, a "Mussolini look"!(Plays to camera). But just watch…I can take it off! (Grins to camera) Now, Signor Mussolini cannot take it off – he is condemned although he’s a most amiable man, he is condemned to go through life with that terrible and imposing expression which really does a great deal of injustice to his kindly nature…But I can put it on and I can take it off…and do all sorts of things. One thing, of course, that I’m really glad you’ve seen me here, is that you will know me when you see me. I’ll tell you something that happened to me the other day….I was at Conway in North Wales…a little girl came over to me, she pulled out an autograph book and said, "please give me your autograph". I said "What do you want my autograph for…? I’m not Mr. Lloyd- George!" "Oh", she said, " I know you are not Mr. Lloyd-George". Well I said, "Now, who am I?" "I don’t know – I’ve forgotten your name, but my Father told me to get your autograph." It’s quite possible that some little girl who is here on this occasion may imagine that she can get an autograph out of me that way, because I gave that little girl the autograph, but you won’t get me a second time…so it’s not the slightest use trying that on. Now, ladies and Gentlemen, I’m afraid I’m always an extremely busy man – at least I pretend I am. And I’m afraid I must go back to work, I must say goodnight. Ah, By the way….this may be a method, goodnight might not be the right thing to say, however, good afternoon, good-day, Good luck!"

Here are some more videos of Shaw: