Books: G. B. S. & E. T.

ELLEN TERRY AND BERNARD SHAW, A CORRESPONDENCE—Putnam ($5).

George Bernard Shaw is old now (75) and Ellen Terry is dead (since 1928); but they were young once. These letters, a record of an amazingly tender affair of the heart, bear witness to their protracted youth. Published not only with Shaw's permission but with his connivance, the book has a foreword by Shaw, numerous explanatory notes. The story the letters tell was a queer affair.

When Shaw was 36 and a music critic in London, Ellen Alicia Terry, 44, was Britain's No. 1 Actress, playing in the company of Britain's No. i Actor, Henry

Irving. Actress Terry first indirectly wrote to Critic Shaw about the musical prospects of a protege of hers. The correspondence continued, grew more & more intimate, but Bernard and Ellen did not meet for eight years. By that time Shaw had married and the romantic bloom had apparently withered. They did not see much of each other afterwards, though Ellen Terry later played the lead in one of Shaw's plays (Captain Brassbound's Conversion). Says Shaw: "She was always a little shy in speaking to me; for talking, hampered by material circumstances, is awkward and unsatisfactory after the perfect freedom of writing between people who can write." This paper love-affair was the symbol of a sincere affection, but the endearments they used might be misconstrued. Shaw says both exaggerated—he from ingrained Irish chivalry, she from stage convention. He called her "dearest and beautifullest," "dearest love"; she called him "sweet-heart," "my beautiful," tried to get him to call her "Nellen," but he wouldn't. Once Shaw wrote to her: "Dearest Love: send me one throb of your heart whilst it is still tender with illness. It will be hard again on Monday; so be quick, quick, quick." Once Ellen Terry wrote to him: "Dear fellow, Goodbye. On each of your fingers', goodbye, and on the end of your little nose, good-bye." As their intimacy progressed they wondered how and when they would meet. They had seen each other in public, at a distance. They just missed meeting several times: once when Ellen Terry knew Shaw was at a conference with Henry Irving she decided to walk in on them, got as far as the door, lost her nerve and went away. When they finally did meet it was under the stage at a play of Shaw's; apparently it was not a very satisfactory encounter.

In his capacity as interfering person and amateur solicitor Shaw wrote Ellen Terry reams of good advice, never tired of trying to persuade her to forsake Shakespeare and Henry Irving (who, Shaw thought, was wasting her talents) and cast in her lot with a really good playwright, one George Bernard Shaw. But she stuck to Irving about as long as he needed her. Shaw admired her loyalty, never ceased to upbraid her wrongheadedness. Loud in his Brobdingnagian denunciations of Henry Irving, Shaw did not resent the fact that Ellen Terry had "many enduring friendships, some transient fancies, and five domestic partnerships of which two were not legalized."