{ARMS AND THE MAN}

By George Bernard Shaw

2018-2019
Fourth Year Drama
Department of English
 ARMS and the MAN

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An anti-romantic comedy in three acts by George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950), who
is an Irish playwright and a critic. Arms and the Man is a humorous play that
shows the uselessness of war and deals comically with the hypocrisies of human
nature.

Character List

Raina: The heroine of the play, she is a central and dynamic character, who
develops and changes throughout the play.
Catherine: Raina’s mother.
Petkoff: Raina’s father.
Sergius: Raina’s fiance.
Bluntschli: A Swiss soldier who joined the Serbs as a professional soldier.
Louka: The young, beautiful maid of the Petkoffs.
Nicola: The dutiful servant of the Petkoff’s.

Themes

Misconception of War/The Romantic View of War

In Arms and the Man, Bernard Shaw condemns war as a vicious, barbarous,
and inhuman act. The cavalry charge for which Sergius is so much praised is
unprofessional and foolish. Contrary to the romantic notion of war and knighthood,
Shaw, through Bluntschli, says that all wise soldiers are afraid to die. Shaw
uncovers the horrors of war. He brings forth the weakness of man at time of war.
he also points out the importance of food in war. Food is more important than
ammunition. That is why the practical soldier Bluntschli carries chocolate instead
of cartridge in the battlefield. Raina ironically calls Bluntschli a chocolate cream
soldier. However, at the end Bluntschli cures her of her illusions and romantic
view by telling her about his experience as a soldier. Thus, the play is about
Shaw’s anti-war and anti-military views.

Misconception of Love

Arms and the Man is subtitled as “An Anti-Romantic Comedy.” Shaw

denounces false romantic relations based on social obligations. In the play, Raina
and Sergius plan to marry because their social status requires a mate from the same
social level; and because Sergius plays the role of the hero that Raina has been
 taught to admire, and Raina plays the role that Sergius expects from

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a woman of her situation. Thus, their love is based on appearances. They are both
acting out a romance according to their idealized standards, rather than according
to their real feelings. Raina has fallen for her brave officer who looks handsome in
his uniform. When Bluntschli and Louka force Raina and Sergius to examine their
true feelings, Raina and Sergius discover that they have the courage and desire to
follow their hearts instead of social expectations.

Class Division/Distinction/Aspiration

As a socialist, Shaw believed in the equality of all people and he abhorred

discrimination based on gender or social class. These beliefs are evident in the
relationships portrayed in the play. Shaw allows a maid to succeed in her ambitions
to better herself by marrying Sergius, an officer and a gentleman. This match also
means that Sergius has developed the courage to free himself from the expectations
of his class and instead marry the woman he loves. Louka is the most adamant
socialist voice in this play. She insists she does not have the “soul of a servant” and

refuses to think of herself as subservient only because she was born into the
working class. The silliness of Catherine’s character is used to show the illogical
nature of class snobbery, as she clearly makes divisions between her family and the
servants even though the Petkoffs themselves have recently climbed the social
ladder. Louka succeeds in winning Sergius, a superior, into marriage.

Identity, Authenticity, and Self-Expression

Arms and the Man is very interested in identity—many of its characters are
themselves acting out certain roles, and the play repeatedly questions what makes a
person’s “true identity.” In addition, the play emphasizes the importance of
remaining authentic to yourself: many characters in the play are liberated once they
learn to stop acting for others and express themselves honestly.

Both Raina and Sergius act out different roles depending on who they are
with. Sergius supposes that he is “six different men” all wrapped into one. Raina
speaks with a certain kind of passion and drama on purpose, because she finds it
has an effect on the listener. They both do a lot of “acting.”

These characters triumph, and form happy relationships, once they stop
acting for the benefit of their family, friends, etc. and allow themselves to act
authentically. Raina is able to let go of her romantic and aristocratic airs and be
 herself with Bluntschli. Bluntschli can only admit his love for her

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after he admits he has a romantic side. Louka and Sergius also end up together
once Sergius admits he is not as romantic and refined as he acts, and once Louka
freely admits the affection is in fact mutual.

Romanticism / Idealism vs. Realism

One of the central criticisms of Arms and the Man is of romanticizing things:
in particular love and war. Literary romanticism began to decline around the time
Shaw was born, and the play in many ways illustrates how and why romanticism
historically failed: because it could not accurately describe fundamental human
experiences.
Raina is the play’s most obvious romantic, and Sergius is described as a
“Byronic hero” after the romantic poet Lord Byron. Her relationship with Sergius
embodies almost all of the romantic ideals: they are both beautiful, refined, and
appear to be in love with each other. However, this romantic, idealistic vision of
love does not stand up when reality sets in. Sergius is courting the servant Louka

and Raina is in love with the anti-romantic Bluntschli. Their ideal romantic love is
all an act. In reality, love is much more complicated, than Raina and Sergius make
it seem.
Raina and Sergius’ flawed romanticism also shows through their conception
of war. Raina admires how Sergius is an ideal soldier: brave, manly, ruthless but
fair. It turns out Sergius’ cavalry charge was foolish, and the charge only
succeeded because the Serbs didn’t have the correct ammunition. Sergius is not the
perfect soldier—he is a farce. And the real soldier, Bluntschli, runs away from
battle and carries sweets instead of a gun. He also speaks honestly about the
violence of war.
Shaw displays an interest in revealing human realities like love and war for
what they really are: often ugly, contradictory, and very complex. He criticizes
romantic art for avoiding these realities, and giving us a sweet version of human
life and human history. He believes that art should be able to show the reality of
human experiences.

Youth vs. Maturity

Shaw’s play investigates the difference between young and old, inexperience
and maturity. Bluntschli repeatedly distinguishes between the young soldiers and
the old soldiers. The young ones are irresponsible, idealistic, and brave—they
 carry extra ammunition and run into action. The old soldiers carry

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food instead of ammo and often flee the battlefield. Raina is young—and she
seems even younger than she is. Bluntschli does not take her seriously until he
realizes she is 23 (and not 17, as he believed). Once he is aware that she is older,
he is willing to take her opinions and beliefs more seriously, and agrees to court
her. Meanwhile, Raina’s parents and their servant Nicola are all “old” (or at least
older than Raina, Louka, and Serge, who are all identified as “young”). However,
unlike Bluntschli, they are not portrayed as mature. Rather, in their more advanced
age, they have simply become rooted in tradition and the status quo.

Shaw paints a complicated picture of age and maturity: youth can be vibrant
and motivate change, but it can also be silly and naïve. Age can mean realism and
intelligence, but it can also mean a kind of disengagement and acceptance of
negative social norms. Shaw’s heroes in this play are those who have the energy of
youth, but the sensibility and maturity of old age.

Heroism
Another central question in the play concerns the nature of heroism. What
makes a hero? What does it mean to be a hero? At first, Sergius is painted as a
hero—he led a successful cavalry charge, displaying immense (in fact foolhardy)
bravery. He is physically strong, courageous, and handsome. He thus embodies a
very traditional kind of heroism. But it is made clear that Sergius’s actions are
considered to be farcical. Though Raina and her mother admire Sergius, others find
him more of a clown than a hero.

Bluntschli is a kind of “anti-hero.” He is named by Raina as the “chocolate

cream soldier”—a name that inspires images of weakness and sweetness—because
he carries chocolates rather than extra ammo. He is older, more modest looking,
and doesn’t believe courage is a virtue. But by the end of the play he is revealed to
be both a better soldier and a far more desirable husband than Sergius, and wins
Raina’s affections.
 Symbols

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Chocolate
Chocolate serves as complex symbol throughout Arms and the Man. At first it
serves as a symbol of Captain Bluntschli’s pragmatism and disdain for
romanticism. Instead of carrying his cartridges, he carries chocolate. During this
time period, soldiers often carried chocolate with low milk content as rations; such
chocolate rarely spoiled, even in humid conditions, and could provide a significant
amount of calories, even in small portions. Raina incorrectly assumed Bluntschli
was carrying a luxurious treat, but it was not a treat, but a practical ration for the
field.

Petkoff’s Coat
Catherine and Raina lend Bluntschli Major Petkoff’s coat to escape. The coat is a
symbol of deception throughout the play. Bluntschli brings the coat back to the
Petkoffs without realizing that Raina has left an inscribed picture of herself in its
pocket, thus indicating to anyone who might see it that she loves Bluntschli despite
being engaged to Sergius. The coat literally hides Raina’s love for Bluntschli, and
this love is only revealed once Raina’s photograph is removed from the coat.
Petkoff cannot find the coat in his closet until Nicola places the coat there after
Bluntschli’s return in order to cover up the story.

The Petkoff Library

The Petkoff family makes a big deal about their library, "the only one in Bulgaria".
It is a point of pride for the Petkoffs, as it shows their upper-class status and
cultured ways. Petkoff tells the Russian soldiers under his command about his
library; Raina tells Bluntschli about the library in order to impress him and
communicate her family's civilized air. However, in the stage directions for Act III,
it is revealed that the "library" is nothing more than a single shelf of books. The
library is ultimately a symbol for the Petkoffs' pretension.
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Characters
Captain Bluntschli

Bluntschli is a realist who believes in adapting to a situation in order to survive. He

is a professional soldier, who knows that he is only a tool and he has no illusions
about war and he knows the practical actions one must take to win battles and stay
alive. His most famous feature is that he keeps chocolates in his cartridge belt
rather than bullets. When Bluntschli takes refuge in Raina’s bedroom, he starts a
chain of events that changes his life and the lives of all those associated with the
Petkoff family. He is a practical man, whose humanity and realistic vision
represent the views of the playwright himself. He is the anti-heroic vision of the
down-to-earth soldier, lover, and later businessman. He cures Raina and Sergius of
their false views of war and love with his experience and objective argument.

Raina Petkoff

Raina is a young woman from an upper class Bulgarian family. She has romantic
illusions about love and war and she tries to live them. She starts to have doubts
about the realism of the notions that she and Sergius share. She learns to discard
her foolish ideals about love in exchange for real love. At the beginning, Raina is
romantic in her views of love and war, before Bluntschli comes through her
window and begins to shatter her fairy-tale illusions with his realism. She is
unworldly and very romantic. In losing Raina and declaring his love for Louka,
Sergius is freed to be himself and to discover his own values. He flirts with Louka,
the maid, and at the end he finds the courage to show his true feelings and asks
Louka to marry him.

Sergius

Sergius is Raina’s somewhat foolish fiancé. Believing in the romantic ideals of

war, he leads a doomed cavalry charge, and he is saved only by dumb luck. His
ignorance of the science of warfare makes him an inept officer, he struggles to
coordinate troops movement and must appeal to Bluntschli for help. He acts out his
love for Raina, but then he finds it exhausting.
 7
Louka

She is the Petkoff’s beautiful maid. She has trouble accepting her place as a maid.
She is engaged to Nicola, an older servant who always lectures her about her
inappropriate behavior. She declares her love for Sergius, unembarrassed by their
difference in social standing. At the end of the play Sergius proposes to her and she
accepts.

Catherine

She is Raina’s mother and shares many of her daughter’s illusions about love and
war, as well as her class presentations.

Major Petkoff

He is Raina’s father. He is like Sergius, unable to coordinate troops movement and

depends on Bluntschli to do his work for him. He serves as a comic relief in the
play.

Nicola

He serves the Petkoff family and is engaged to Louka at the beginning of the play.
He is a very practical man and he understands and embraces his social position. He
dreams of opening a store and approaches his goal in a pragmatic way. When
Louka and Sergius’ relationship comes to light he gracefully withdraws his
engagement to Louka. Towards the end of the play, Bluntschli announces his
intention to hire Nicola to help run one of his hotels.
 ACT I

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The Setting: TIME: night, late in November 1885.
PLACE: A lady’s bedchamber in Bulgaria, in a small town near the
Dragoman Pass.
Through the furniture of the bedchamber, we know that the Petkoff’s family
is rich. However, there is contrast in the furniture as it is not like anything to be
seen in Europe. It is half rich Bulgarian, and half cheap Viennese (there is a mix of
expensive and cheap furniture). We can see a young, beautiful, romantic, and
imaginative girl looking through an open window at the night sky, thinking and
dreaming of her fiancé. She is living in her ideal world, while outside there is war,
and a bloody battle between her country (Bulgaria) and the Serbs.
There is also a conflict here between idealism (represented by the character of
Raina) and realism (represented by the character of Bluntschli).

Petkoff sent a letter to his wife, Catherine, telling her that the Bulgarian
army achieved a victory over the Serbs, and Sergius was the hero of the battle.
Catherine says that to her daughter, Raina, telling her about the victory over the
Serbs which was achieved by her fiancé, Sergius. She tells her that Sergius
disobeyed his Russian commanders, led a charge on his own responsibility. He
headed the charge himself, he attacked and stood before the Serbs’ guns and he
was the hero of Bulgaria.
This is an irony because this situation shows us that Sergius has no true
knowledge in the art of war, because he disobeyed the orders of his commanders
and threw himself and his soldiers in front of the fires of the Serbs; but fortunately,
the enemy had no ammunition to shoot them.
Raina blames herself for thinking that Sergius’ heroic qualities and heroism
might only be an imagination and not real, but now after the victory she is sure that
he is a true hero and she would never forgive herself for thinking otherwise. This is
also irony, because we know that he only won the battle by chance.
In this play, Bernard Shaw criticizes people who live in ideal thoughts, who
are not practical, away from reality, and who live in romantic and imaginative
world like Raina and Sergius. And he shows that people who are practical,
professional, who know the reality of war and the world will win at the end with no
regrets, like Bluntschli.
Louka, the maid, enters Raina’s bedroom to tell her that there is a Serbian
fugitive who ran away from the battlefield and that the Bulgarian cavalry are
looking for him to kill him. Raina wishes her people were not so cruel to kill a
 fugitive and that there is no glory in killing him. This situation

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indicates that Raina has a kind heart. Raina describes this night as the happiest
night of her life because of her fiancé’s victory, if only there were no fugitives,
because she is romantic, imaginative and thinks of Sergius as a hero. However, this
is also dramatic irony, because of that fugitive who will enter her room and who
will be the reason to change her views and turn from a romantic person to a
practical one.
As Raina keeps dreaming of her hero, the fugitive (Bluntschli) enters her
bedroom through the open window. He orders her to keep silent, otherwise he
would kill her. This is also an irony because his revolver is empty and he never
had ammunition, but he always carries chocolate instead of bullets.
When Bluntschli threatens to kill Raina, she tells him that some men are
afraid to die. She says that to express that he is, in fact, afraid to die and that she
felt that through his voice and appearance. She thinks that a soldier should die in
the battlefield better than running away and threatening a peaceful lady. However,
Bluntschli says that all soldiers are afraid of death, because their duty is to keep
themselves alive as long as possible. These lines show us that Bluntschli is a
practical man who looks to the reality and not idealism.
When a group of Bulgarian soldiers try to enter the Petkoff’s house to search
for the fugitive, Bluntschli tries to take Raina’s cloak to prevent her from covering
herself so she would not let anyone get into her bedroom and see her in her night
gown. He tells Raina that this cloak is the best thing to prevent his from death, and
that it is even better that the revolver. However, when the Bulgarian soldiers do get
into Raina’s bedroom, he throws the cloak back at her and tell her to keep out of
the way and not to look because he will fight those soldiers and it will get very
bloody, and women should not see tragic things like death. This situation indicates
that Bluntschli is a gentleman, brave, and courageous, not a coward as Raina was
thinking before.
This is the point where things start to change in the play, as Raina was
looking at Bluntschli as an enemy, a selfish Serb’s fugitive, and a coward. But now
she looks at him as a gentleman and she decides to save him and to protect him
when she tells him to hide behind the curtains.
After the soldiers are gone without finding him, he comes out of his hiding
place and thanks Raina telling her that he will be grateful for her forever for saving
his life, and that he wishes if he had joined the Bulgarian army instead of the
Serbian army for her sake. This shows that Bluntschli begins to like Raina because
she young, beautiful, romantic, and brave enough to save him.
Raina thinks that Bluntschli is one of the Austrians who encouraged the
Serbs to fight the Bulgarians and rob their liberty, but he tells her that he is a Swiss
mercenary, fighting as a professional soldier, and he only joined the Serbs because
 10
they came first. This indicates that he a practical person and he doesn’t believe in
the romantic idea of war, but he is only there for the money.
When Raina discovers the revolver on her bed, she gets frightened and gives
it to Bluntschli telling him to use it to protect himself. However, he tells her that
the revolver is useless because it is not loaded. He had no ammunition to load the
gun. He suggests that ammunition is useless in battles when soldiers are hungry
and have nothing to eat, and he’d rather carry chocolates instead of cartridges.
Raina is surprised at him and starts to imagine him as a school-boy who
stuffs his pockets with chocolates, not as a real soldier. This suggests that Raina
looks at the soldiers as heroes and their duty is to fight with their guns heroically or
to die in battlefields. This is a romantic way of looking at things. Her ideals of
manhood and heroism are broken when she hears Bluntschli’s speech about
carrying chocolates instead of ammunition in the battlefield.
After giving him some chocolates, Raina tells Bluntschli that he is just as
brave as he is. However, he breaks her imaginative world when he tells her that
she hasn’t been under attack for three days like he was, that she hasn’t seen war
closely as he has, and she hasn’t lived one moment of real war to see how soldiers
are killed as animals. He is nervous and tired because of that.
Through the character of Bluntschli, Bernard Shaw explains the reality of
war rather than its false glamour. He wants to express that war is a tragic and a
catastrophic thing, and not glorious as Raina thinks.
Then Bluntschli starts telling Raina how and why the Bulgarians won the
war. He explains that they won due to the sheer (complete) ignorance in the art of
war and it was a chance, no more than that. He says that it is unprofessional to
throw a regiment of cavalry on a battery of machine guns, and unfortunately, the
Serbs had no ammunition in their machine guns to kill the Bulgarians. The
Bulgarians’ charge was stupid because it the Serbs had ammunition they would
have killed every man and horse of the Bulgarians. And the Bulgarians only won
because the Serbs had nothing to kill them with.
Then he starts to make fun of the first soldier in the Bulgarian army who
started the charge. He says that he is not as brave as he thinks, he didn’t lead the
charge by his will, but his horse ran away towards the Serbs’ machine guns and
pulled him along. He couldn’t control his horse, and his soldiers followed him
thinking that the charge had started.
Raina starts to defend the first soldier and says that he is not a coward, but
he is a hero because he is her fiancé, Sergius. But Bluntschli keeps making fun of
him when he compares him to an opera singer when he shouts his war-cry and
charge at the Serbs like Don Quixote charging at the windmill when he thought
they were giants. Bluntschli describes Sergius as Don Quixote to make fun of him,
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because Sergius thought that he had done the bravest thing at the battle of
Slivnitza, but in reality he must be punished for his foolish and unprofessional
action and for driving himself and his soldiers to suicide. He revealed the reality
of what happened in the battlefield because he is practical and professional
who presents the realistic picture of war.
Bluntschli starts feeling sorry for laughing at Sergius so he tells Raina that
maybe he started the charge because he knew the Serbs had no ammunition, not
because he was foolish. But this makes Raina feel angrier because she thinks that
now Bluntschli is accusing Sergius of being a pretender and a coward.
Raina orders Bluntschli to get out of her room and climb down the water
pipe back to the street, but he tells her that he is too tired to climb now because he
hasn’t slept in three days. She tells him that it takes less courage to climb down the
water-pipe (she encourages him to get out), but he tells her that capture means
death; and death means sleep; and sleep is the only thing he needs right now
because he is very tired and can’t do anything right now. Then she lets him stay in
her bedroom and sleep and she names him “Chocolate Cream Soldier”.
 ACT II

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Setting: the sixteenth of March, 1886. In the garden of Major Petkoff’s
house.
In act II, we see Louka the maid and a new character (Nicola) who is the
make servant of the Petkoffs. They are in the garden discussing an important
subject, which is class differences. Louka, who is presented as having a new
female character is smoking a cigarette and talking to her fiance Nicola without
feeling afraid of him or of her masters. She is bold and defiant enough to turn her
back to him while he is talking. This indicates that she does not accept his way of
lecturing her, and does not agree on what he is saying.
Nicola is a middle-aged man of cool temperament. He is so satisfied with his
job, and does not want to lose it in any way. He tells Louka to mend her manners
with Raina and to behave respectfully, because if Raina discovers that Louka is
challenging her, the Petkoffs will dismiss her and she will lose her job. This shows
that Nicola is a dutiful and obedient character who has the soul of the servant. He
advises Louka to behave according to her position.