PRIVATE SHAW AND PUBLIC SHAW

Professor dual portrait of George Bernard Shaw and Lawrence of Arabia is a rather proteins and provocative bit of scholarly snooping. It draws upon published and unpublished correspondence (especially between the two), newspaper and critical innuendoes; in time it extends from the early twenties to the mid-thirteens in spirit it attempts an inquiry more into the mythology of Lawrence than that of , and this is as it should be. For the mystery man of WWI, the ""Prince of Mecca"", the and of England's Middle-East campaign, who sought in peacetime to be ""degraded to the ranks"" and enlisted first in the RAF as Pvt. Ross, then in the Army as Pvt. Shaw ( the book's title), has been and will continue to be one of the modern lay magnets for speculation and romance. But unfortunately, though the mentorli relationship between the playwright and the military hero, which began when Lawrence was and existed till his motorcycle death at 46, is presented with a , the psyche and its attendant anonymity quest, sexual malai. Oxbridge playacting and para-adolescent agst, never quite comes off; like the names of celebrated friends (Hardy, lady Astor, Graves) which glitter through the the more demanding aspects, of Lawrence's personality only flash fitfully, then fade. Still, an entertaining chronicle bound to engage legend-hunters on both sides of the .