There was no country which didn’t have its own take on the subjects of

There was no country which didn’t have its own “take” on the subjects of class division and social mobility, and it’s as enjoyable to view these subtle differences in settings and costumes as it is to imagine translators wracking their brains for their own equivalent of “Not bloody likely”.Such images suggest quite strongly that theatre is a genuinely internationalising art form, and cinema, even with subtitles, a globalising one.Most scholarship has reduced Shaw to an anglophone phenomenon, and has left us almost unaware of the existence of a dense network of international conversations, correspondences, shared enthusiasms, and arguments about meaning. It has also confirmed us in our view of the 20th century as a period of Anglo-Saxon cultural ascendancy. Yet of all people, Shaw, an Irishman, from the edge of an empire, possessing little of an English classical education but a great deal of the languages and idioms of the Europe of his day, should be able to lead us to a different view.We need to think again about the links between Britain and the Continent, and between the Old World and the New. The revival of My Fair Lady has been heralded by some fascinating accounts of its origins; but they’ve missed the wider story. It’s not, after all, a paradox, but entirely fitting that the composer, Frederick Loewe, should have been an emigrant to the US – and, moreover, born in Vienna.. The outrage felt by some at the news that Donald Dewar was worth more than £2m is telling but not surprising. Not surprising because only the willfully blind could have believed that Dewar was anything but prosperous.

Telling because so many of his surviving colleagues live the double-life he managed, but few with his nonchalant panache.Dewar’s reputation for down-at-heel eccentricity was expertly cultivated. Interviewer after profile-writer was invited to observe his home on one of Glasgow’s most exclusive streets Twenty three Cleveden Drive was a mess. He kept it that way in mourning for his failed marriage and absent children. But it was lined with precious art and first editions bought on foraging trips in Glasgow and London.
Dewar knew the value of money and relished its power. He was never as focused as when discussing inward investment projects or corporate mergers. Of course the interest was professional; Dewar as shadow secretary of state, cabinet minister and then first minister had to be well informed.

But it went further than that.Time and again I witnessed his fascination with big-money deals. He would go to great lengths to arrange meetings with those involved and used his contacts in financial institutions to open doors. If the health service and state education were subjects of academic interest, high finance held visceral appeal.Corporate Scotland knew Dewar would “play the Scottish card” and refer a merger to the department of trade and industry if he had not been kept fully informed. Experienced figures knew that “keeping Donald in the loop” would smooth the path to success. When I was involved in a failed proposal to merge the Scotsman and Herald newspapers Dewar walked to my home from his sickbed nearby and spent two hours discussing the scheme. Amicably but with blunt honesty he explained that he could block the plan and certainly would if he was not consulted.But if large sums of money fascinated him Dewar could be parsimonious with smaller figures He paid me a meagre salary. More than a third of his allocated research allowance was returned to the public purse When I asked him for a rise he turned me down.