Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Androcles and the Lion
    Androcles and the Lion
    Androcles and the Lion
    Ebook63 pages1 hour

    Androcles and the Lion

    By George Bernard Shaw

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) is revered as one of the great British dramatists, credited not only with memorable works, but the revival of the then-suffering English theatre. Shaw was born in Dublin, Ireland, left mostly to his own devices after his mother ran off to London to pursue a musical career. He educated himself for the most part, and eventually worked for a real estate agent. This experience founded in him a concern for social injustices, seeing poverty and general unfairness afoot, and would go on to address this in many of his works. In 1876, Shaw joined his mother in London where he would finally attain literary success. "Androcles and the Lion" is Shaw's take on the tale of Androcles, addressing the irreconcilable differences between the teachings of Jesus and traditional Roman values. Though the play deals with the heavy topics of Christianity and its social influence, Shaw uses comedy as a vehicle to propel this memorable theatrical work which is still read and performed to this day.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDigireads.com Publishing
    Release dateJan 1, 2011
    ISBN9781596748187
    Androcles and the Lion
    Author

    George Bernard Shaw

    George Bernard Shaw was born in Dublin in 1856 and moved to London in 1876. He initially wrote novels then went on to achieve fame through his career as a journalist, critic and public speaker. A committed and active socialist, he was one of the leaders of the Fabian Society. He was a prolific and much lauded playwright and was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. He died in 1950.

    Read more from George Bernard Shaw

    Related to Androcles and the Lion

    Related ebooks

    Performing Arts For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Remembering Sam Shepard

      Jul 31, 2017

      Remembering Sam Shepard
      3 min read

    • Article

      Change Of Heart

      May 7, 2020

      Change Of Heart
      7 min read

    • Article

      The Friendly Lion

      Jul 3, 2019

      The Friendly Lion
      3 min read

    • Article

      The Unmannerly Tiger

      Nov 4, 2020

      The Unmannerly Tiger
      3 min read

    • Article

      An ever-fixed MARK

      Nov 1, 2023

      An ever-fixed MARK
      6 min read

    • Article

      Large Animals

      Oct 6, 2021

      Imagine you’re a vet who has to perform surgery on a cat. Except it’s not a pet cat. It’s the biggest of the big cats – a Siberian tiger! So, a three-metre-long tiger is lying there, needing a fang removed. You’ve pumped enough drugs into it to send

      6 min read

    • Article

      Wendy’s WALKOUT

      Jun 24, 2020

      “Well, I wasn’t expecting that. If you could get hold of the feather that was last year’s WW’s Best Dieter (Feather Category), you’d still be able to knock me down with it. This could even be the sort of crisis that requires two trips to the fourth e

      3 min read

    • Article

      One Word: Striking

      Jun 26, 2019

      One Word: Striking
      4 min read

    • Article

      Mrs Macarthur’s Secret Diary

      Jun 17, 2020

      Mrs Macarthur’s Secret Diary
      7 min read

    • Article

      Lol

      Jul 14, 2021

      Lol
      3 min read

    • Article

      Mrs Macarthur’s Secret Diary

      Jun 17, 2020

      Mrs Macarthur’s Secret Diary
      7 min read

    • Article

      Hitting a SOUR NOTE

      Sep 22, 2021

      Hitting a SOUR NOTE
      3 min read

    • Article

      Winning Letter

      Sep 16, 2022

      She lit up the starry skies with her angelic smile and words of wisdom. A lady of class, valour and stature, a quietly religious, dignified woman, who always held her head up high and seldom shed a tear. She cared about others and not herself, my dea

      5 min read

    • Article

      The King’s passion

      Aug 11, 2021

      The King’s passion
      11 min read

    • Article

      Fiction: Wolfdreams

      Feb 12, 2022

      Fiction: Wolfdreams
      6 min read

    • Article

      Season Of Goodwill? (You Might Need It)

      Nov 8, 2023

      CHRISTMAS is on the way and those of us with parrots have a lot extra to decide in the way of activities, extra food, presents, guests and so on. My first two parrots, the African greys Artha and Casper, taught me far more than I taught them. Althoug

      4 min read

    • Article

      Taking Sides

      Apr 1, 2022

      Taking Sides
      7 min read

    • Article

      The King’s passion

      Aug 11, 2021

      The King’s passion
      11 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Androcles and the Lion

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Androcles and the Lion - George Bernard Shaw

      ANDROCLES AND THE LION

      BY GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

      A Digireads.com Book

      Digireads.com Publishing

      Print ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-4119-7

      Ebook ISBN 13: 978-1-59674-818-7

      This edition copyright © 2011

      Please visit www.digireads.com

      CONTENTS

      PROLOGUE

      ACT I

      ACT II

      ANDROCLES AND THE LION

      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. It's 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. But I gave it up when I became a Christian.

      MEGAERA. You'd much better have remained a drunkard. I can forgive

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1