e lecturing, journalism and the publication of three
considerable and two minor books, Chesterton between 1911 and the War
wrote the play that Shaw had been so insistently demanding. The books
were: _Manalive_ 1911, _A Miscellany of Men_ (Essays) 1912, _The
Victorian Age in Literature_ February 1913, _The Wisdom of Father
Brown_ 1914, _The Flying Inn_ 1914. The play was _Magic_ produced at
the Little Theatre in October 1913. One who admired it was George
Moore. He wrote to Forster Bovill (November 24, 1913):

I followed the comedy of _Magic_ from the first line to the last with
interest and appreciation, and I am not exaggerating when I say that
I think of all modern plays I like it the best. Mr. Chesterton wished
to express an idea and his construction and his dialogue are the best
that he could have chosen for the expression of that idea: therefore,
I look upon the play as practically perfect. The Prologue seems
unnecessary, likewise the magician's love for the young lady. That
she should love the magician is well enough, but it materialises him
a little too much if he returns that love. I would have preferred her
to love him more and he to love her less. But this spot, if it be a
spot, is a very small one on a spotless surface of excellence.

I hope I can rely upon you to tell Mr. Chesterton how much I
appreciated his Play as I should like him to know my artistic
sympathies.

"Artistic sympathies" is not ungenerous considering how Chesterton
had written of George Moore in _Heretics_.

It is rather comic that all the reviews hailing from Germany where
the play was very soon produced compare Chesterton with Shaw and many
of them say that he is the better playwright. "He means more to it,"
a Munich paper was translated as saying, "than the good old Shaw."
Chesterton's superiority can hardly be entertained in the matter of
technique. Actually what the critic meant was that he preferred the
ideas of Chesterton to the ideas of Shaw. Both men were chiefly
concerned with ideas. But while Shaw excelled chiefly in presenting
them through brilliant dialogue, G.K.'s deeper thoughts were conveyed
in another fashion. The Duke might almost, it is true, have been a
Shaw character, but the fun the audience got out of him was the least
thing they received. Chesterton once said that he suspected Shaw of
being the only man who had never written any poetry. Many of us
suspect that Chesterton