The Novels

The Novels

The Man In The Glass Booth

(1967)

Shaw pictured with Donald Pleasence in the London production of his two part play The Man in the Glass Booth.

Robert Shaw did not act for most of 1967. It wasn't that opportunity wasn't knocking, it was just that he had become more selective in his roles. Shaw had finally earned the respect he deserved as an author and admitted, "there's a legend around that all actors are stupid." He preferred writing, stating that acting revealed his childlike side. An American producer had once said to him, "For Christ's sake Bob, write another book, we need some more prestige." Shaw was becoming very serious about his subjects, stating that "My books get blacker and blacker. I'm trying to cut out completely any idea of appealing to an audience."

It has been seen by many to be anti-Semitic when in fact it was actually the opposite. Shaw was quite horrified to learn of the atrocities as a young man and he was quoted defending it by saying, "First, Goldman sees that he lives in a very stupid and cruel world, where terrible things like the Nazi atrocities have been going on for centuries and no one has yet learned a damn thing from any of them. Two, he is convinced that it is time for Jews to forgive the Germans. Not forget exactly but forgive. Three, he wants to stand up in court and publicly acknowledge a guilt that no true Nazi would ever acknowledge. And he is an old man, and wants one last grand gesture...That's all...Goldman is not a psychotic, a masochist or a Christ figure. He is Christ-like only in that he is courageous." Funny, I understood this when I was only 12, having borrowed the book from our local library.

Goldman is a wealthy New York industrialist, living in a luxurious Manhattan high-rise, surrounding himself with antique furniture, rich draperies and paintings. He shocks his assistant Charlie with his outrageous outbursts, mood swings and barking commands at him constantly. Goldman starts to act even stranger after hearing the Pope officially forgiving the Jews for the death of Christ. At one point, the reader begins to wonder if he is actually Adolf Dorff, a former SS officer as he is abducted by Israeli agents and put on trial for mass murder. There is even a room, filled with Nazi memorabilia, and he tries to burn the SS number and blood type from his arm on the night before his arrest. The trial, similar to that of Adolph Eichmann which actually took place in 1960, has Goldman sitting in a glass booth facing his accusers. There is a final twist. Goldman, in full Nazi uniform, is talking about the holocaust and the Nazi's hatred of Jews, admitting to all the crimes without hesitation, describing them in great detail when an old woman identifies him as Arthur Goldman, a concentration camp survivor. He is not a Nazi, possibly not a Jew either. Goldman appears to have falsified the dental records the Israelis used to identify him, to bring about the trial. He locks himself in the glass booth, takes off his uniform, a seemingly broken man and that is the end of the play. Is Goldman actually Dorf or vice versa one is left wondering?

http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/biographies/eichmann.htm

Shaw said that he had wanted to "send people out of the theatre pondering." He was not the type of playwright to spoon feed his critics. It was seen as both a very controversial and thought provoking play about the horrors of the holocaust and man's inhumanity to man. If Hitler had chosen the Jews instead would they have followed him as well and carried out the same crimes against humanity and war crimes? This is obvious in Goldman's speech at the end, "people of Israel, if he had chosen you...if he had chosen you...you also would have followed where he led."

Donald Pleasence and Paul Michael Glaser in the Broadway production of Shaw's play, The Man in the Glass Booth.

A Card From Morocco

(1969)

Robert Shaw began writing his fifth novel on the set of The Royal Hunt of the Sun. Originally called "The Two Gentlemen of Madrid", then "The Telegram", he was finding it harder to write with his increasing family and the film work he would find necessary to support them. He was quoted as saying, "I believe that if I didn't act I'd write three times as much but, on the other hand, earning a bit of money as an actor gives me total freedom as a writer. And I have this huge family and I like to live well." His demanding schedule of the late sixties made it only possible for him to write short works.

A Card From Morocco is the story of two men, an Englishman and an American who meet over drinks in Madrid and share stories of their troubles. Slattery is the American, he was previously an athlete but is now a painter. Lewis is the Englishman, a wealthy man but unlucky at love. Their meetings usually end in an argument, as Slattery seems to be a "mean drunk" but more is revealed about their lives following each quarrel. The two opposites form an unlikely bond and Slattery reveals himself to Lewis by stating, "There is no way to cure me, I am too intelligent." This has been translated to be Shaw reflecting on his own intelligence and it is said that many of the characteristics of each character could be found in Shaw. This is an excerpt from More Than A Life, the biography by Carmean and Gaston. This is speculative and in itself, open to interpretation. I never knew Robert Shaw or met the man in person. I am not a journalist, nor do I have the same freedom of speech. I am simply quoting the biography to give everyone a better understanding of what the novel is purportedly about, having found it somewhat confusing myself. I understood the rest of Shaw's works.

Shaw was also said to be refining his own art, revealed in a scene between the two men when Slattery is giving Lewis a lesson in painting. Shaw was trying to amalgamate fantasy, fiction and drama so that the reader would feel like they were taking part in a dream.

The London Times described the book as being "terse, poetic" and The New York Times saw it as a "sharply controlled story." Other critics found the novel "hard to follow" and a "dull novel." The New Yorker criticized that it was indeed a boring story with "absurd pasteboard characters."

Robert Shaw's greatest criticism would come from his eldest daughter Debbie's teacher at Wycombe Abbey's school for girls. "Your father cannot write. I do enjoy his stories. But his grammar is appalling." He could but once again I must add that he did not spoon feed his readers and for some, that can be rather unsettling. Shaw would later ask Debbie to be his secretary whilst writing The Ice Floe, his last and unfinished novel.

The Ice Floe

"If we do exit in the midday of our lives."

That line, from Robert Shaw's last and unfinished novel, was chillingly written in the last twenty four hours of his life. He had been struggling to come up with an ending to his novel, one which had taken him seven years to write. Shaw found old age "a terrifying subject" and one that made him feel "haunted." He truly believed that it would bring him the literary recognition he had desired for so many years. The kind of recognition that he was hoping would surpass his acting talent.

"As you grow older, you start to think more deeply about things that don't really concern you when you're young, like religion-it's self-induced human comfort. It would be very nice to believe it all. I'd love to, I'm an atheist. The agnostic view is much tougher. There are no props except yourself."

It was originally entitled Flesh and Blood, the story of a kind of uprising in a retirement home. The protagonist is an old Spaniard who marries an even older woman. All is well until his grandson writes to him from Viet Nam, telling him that he is going to contemplating suicide. The plan is to get the boys out with a regiment that swells to 200,000 and goes as far as buying a boat for the planned rescue.

"You have daughters and you have sons. Do what you can. Leave to them what is best in you. If we do exit in the midday of our lives...let us go by the only doors still worthy of opening. And let us leave as many bricks behind as we can."

Shaw never finished the novel, even though he had found a suitable ending he was finally satisfied with. He would die of a massive heart attack the following day, August 28, 1978.

Most excerpts were taken from the biography More Than A Life, Carmean and Gaston.

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