Summary
of the short story ‘THE KING AND THE DOCTORS’ by George Bernard Shaw
Bernard Shaw’s ‘The King and the Doctors’ is a fine
satire on doctors who belong to different schools and faiths in the profession
of medicine. It criticizes their professional rivalries which often hinder rather
than help patients improve their health.
In the country of the Half Mad the King fell ill. As
he had established very kindly relations with his subjects, his illness caused
a great affection for him and for his family. The king had twelve doctors to
attend him but there was no sign of his being cured. People became anxious.
They said a single doctor was generally sufficient to kill one of them, so how
the king could survive twelve doctors.
The Prince asked the chief physician whether it was
not possible to cure the King. The physician replied that everything was being
done that could properly done. The physician asked if he had no confidence in
their knowledge and devotion. The prince said that their devotion was all right
but their knowledge was bunk. The chief physician was highly scandalized. He
requested the Prince to suggest any measure they had omitted.
They discussed on giving drugs. The Prince questioned
whether drugs were bunk or not. The physician said that undoubtedly drugs are
bunk from a purely secular point of view. The Prince said that there was a way
of giving drugs in infinitesimal quantities to which all the latest discoveries
and scientific speculations point as the right way. The physician replied that
infinitesimals were used only by homeopaths. He said that they were ignorant of
the nature of disease and they merely treat its symptoms. If a Chinese patient
had been brought to a homeopath he would have been treated for yellow fever.
The Prince asked physician whether he knew the nature
of the disease. The physician said that certainly he knew. He said that he had
passed an examination in pathology and written books about it. The prince asked
what the nature of his father’s complained was. The physician said that it was
pleurisy. The prince said that he knew its symptoms and asked again what its
nature was. The physician replied that if he had knew that he could have cured
it. The Prince said that then pathology was bunk. The prince said that let them
call in a homeopath. The physician said that there was only one successful
homeopath in London and added that if he had discussed the case with him he
should have been excommunicated.
The Prince
said that he heard that a lot of came from spinal displacement. Then he asked
about the King’s spinal. The physician said it looked all right. But the Prince
said that there were trained chaps to feel it is all right. There was a machine
that will register on a galvanometer displacement that nobody can feel. The
physician said that he had never heard of it. He assured that those people who feel
spines’ were almost ignorant Americans who had spent two years in mere manual
training. If he had been seen speaking to one he should have been
excommunicated. The Prince asked the physician to do it himself. The physician
said that he had not had the two years training and said that it was not part
of our official surgery. The Prince said that official surgery was washed out.
Then the Prince asked about testing his father’s
blood for radiations. And said that it could be done by a rheostat and there
was some method of neutralizing the rays that sometimes cures. The physician said that it was discovered by
an American. He was not only American but a Jew. But the Prince persisted that
he understood he was a proper doctor. The physician said that the treatment
would involve attaching the King to the electric switch and the public opinion
would never tolerate that. The Prince said he did not want to lose his father
because people were fools. He said he could use a private battery. The
physician said it was recognized their Vatican and it had not been proved by at
least fifty years of experience in curing disease. The Prince asked whether the
patients recovered under the logical appropriate treatments which were being
taught by in their medical college. The physician said that it was true and the
recuperative power of the human organism was marvelous. The Prince said that he was not satisfied and
it seemed to him that his father just because he was a king, was cut off from
the benefit of all the new discoveries and treatments that are available for
his subjects.
The physician requested the Prince to be patient and
said that his father was in the hands of God. The prince said he should like to
call in Pope for a consultation. But the physician said that he was qualified
more than half a century ago and might not be quite up to date. The Prince said
that then the pope was another wash out. The Prince asked what the most
up-to-date scientific treatment for his father was. The physician said he had
already ordered it. The Prince asked what the treatment was. The physician said
that was seaside. The Prince said that that was not the latest treatment and it
was what his grandmother recommended.
The physician said the benefits arose from change of
air. The Prince asked what it arose from. The physician requested the prince
not to reveal their professional secret. The Prince promised not to reveal the
secret. The physician whispered that it would get him away from doctors.
Shortly afterward, the King recovered.
Moral: Too much of anything is good for nothing.
