Love Quote by George Bernard Shaw

Shaw’s genius here is the way he makes romantic suffering sound like a lifestyle accessory. A “broken heart,” in the standard Victorian script, is supposed to confer moral depth: you have loved, you have lost, you are therefore interesting. Shaw flips it into something closer to a brunch anecdote, “a very pleasant complaint,” the kind of pain you can afford to savor because it won’t actually ruin you.

The line’s bite comes from its two quiet qualifiers: “in London” and “if he has a comfortable income.” London isn’t just scenery; it’s a machine for turning private feelings into public performance. In a city built on class display, melancholy can be worn like a well-cut coat. And income is the real plot twist. Shaw is telling you that heartbreak is not universally tragic; it’s stratified. When your rent is paid and your future is insulated, emotional collapse becomes a temporary weather system, something you can narrate, aestheticize, even enjoy for the attention and self-dramatization it licenses.

The gendered “for a man” matters too. Shaw needles a particular kind of masculine privilege: the gentleman who can indulge “sensitivity” without it threatening his survival or reputation. Underneath the wit is a materialist critique that never stops being contemporary. We still treat certain forms of suffering as proof of authenticity, but the ability to luxuriate in pain-to take time off, to heal, to make art out of it-is often a financial perk. Shaw’s joke lands because it’s not only cruel; it’s accurate.