One of our friends wanted to know the source of the following Shaw quotation:
"I have never thought much of the courage of a lion tamer. Inside the cage he is at least safe from other men."
Well, although I think this quotation may be attested in other sources, Archibald Henderson's George Bernard Shaw: His Life and Works (A Critical
Biography) is the oldest written record I could find (1911). On page
204 we can read the above excerpt and some more contextual material, also
relevant to the quotation:
"for man is the only animal of which I am thoroughly
and cravenly afraid. I have never thought much of the courage of a lion tamer.
Inside the cage he is at least safe from other men. There is not much harm in
a lion. He has no ideals, no religion, no politics, no chivalry, no
gentility; in short, no reason for destroying anything that he does not want to
eat."
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