Details
GEORGE BERNARD SHAW (1856-1950)
An unusual two-page autograph letter, signed, from 10 Adelphi Terrace, W.C.2, 16th January 1923, to Percy Hord, written with a number of contrasting nibs and inks in order to demonstrate how a split downstroke cannot be the product of "normal handwriting." He writes: "I can't do it with my fountain pen because no matter how hard I press it the ink fills up the stroke," though he admits letters can be split with "a steel pen and ordinary thick ink." They are, nevertheless, an "infallible sign" of madness, and after trying to reproduce some examples in the letter, which "would mean Murder," he comments: "I have started 33 letters which have split downstrokes. Just try the experiment of producing these splits yourself. The force required will convince you at once that they could not occur in a normal handwriting. It is quite a useful tip to an editor." He then advises Hord: "Do not take any notice of the man. When a lunatic finds an audience he spends the rest of his life addressing it and sometimes ends by plunging a knife into it. Never let a lunatic impress you, or extract an answer to a letter: it is bad for him and not safe for you."
Provenance: Percy Hord, editor of The Sunday Chronicle, the vendor's grandfather.
An unusual two-page autograph letter, signed, from 10 Adelphi Terrace, W.C.2, 16th January 1923, to Percy Hord, written with a number of contrasting nibs and inks in order to demonstrate how a split downstroke cannot be the product of "normal handwriting." He writes: "I can't do it with my fountain pen because no matter how hard I press it the ink fills up the stroke," though he admits letters can be split with "a steel pen and ordinary thick ink." They are, nevertheless, an "infallible sign" of madness, and after trying to reproduce some examples in the letter, which "would mean Murder," he comments: "I have started 33 letters which have split downstrokes. Just try the experiment of producing these splits yourself. The force required will convince you at once that they could not occur in a normal handwriting. It is quite a useful tip to an editor." He then advises Hord: "Do not take any notice of the man. When a lunatic finds an audience he spends the rest of his life addressing it and sometimes ends by plunging a knife into it. Never let a lunatic impress you, or extract an answer to a letter: it is bad for him and not safe for you."
Provenance: Percy Hord, editor of The Sunday Chronicle, the vendor's grandfather.