About the People:
Race to Witch Mountain
— President Obama in Strasbourg on Friday, April 3, 2009
"George Bernard Shaw once wrote, 'Some people see things as they are and say why? I dream things that never were and say, why not?'"
— Robert Kennedy, University of Kansas, March 18, 1968
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George Bernard Shaw:
THE SNAKE. I can talk of many things. I am very wise. It was I who whispered the word to you that you did not know. Dead. Death. Die. EVE [shuddering] Why do you remind me of it? I forgot it when I saw your beautiful hood. You must not remind me of unhappy things. THE SERPENT. Death is not an unhappy thing when you have learnt how to conquer it. EVE. How can I conquer it? THE SERPENT. By another thing, called birth. EVE. What? [Trying to pronounce it] B-birth? THE SERPENT. Yes, birth. EVE. What is birth? THE SERPENT. The serpent never dies. Some day you shall see me come out of this beautiful skin, a new snake with a new and lovelier skin. That is birth. EVE. I have seen that. It is wonderful. THE SERPENT. If I can do that, what can I not do? I tell you I am very subtle. When you and Adam talk, I hear you say 'Why?' Always 'Why?' You see things; and you say 'Why?' But I dream things that never were; and I say 'Why not?' I made the word dead to describe my old skin that I cast when I am renewed. I call that renewal being born. EVE. Born is a beautiful word. THE SERPENT. Why not be born again and again as I am, new and beautiful every time? EVE. I! It does not happen: that is why. THE SERPENT. That is how; but it is not why. Why not? EVE. But I should not like it. It would be nice to be new again; but my old skin would lie on the ground looking just like me; and Adam would see it shrivel up and– THE SERPENT. No. He need not. There is a second birth. EVE. A second birth? THE SERPENT. Listen. I will tell you a great secret…. |
"Listen, I tell you a mystery…."
— Saul of Tarsus
About the People
(with apologies to
Zenna Henderson):
"We've got to stop meeting like this."