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Arms and the Man

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First published: 1898
Pages: 97

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Act 1
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Act 2
45:30
Act 3
58:07

Arms and the Man (1894) is a public domain work.

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About this book

Set during the Serbo-Bulgarian War of 1885, this comedy skewers the romance of soldiering through Raina Petkoff, a young Bulgarian woman who idolizes her dashing fiance and his cavalry heroics. Then a weary Swiss mercenary named Bluntschli climbs through her bedroom window seeking shelter, carrying chocolates instead of cartridges and no illusions about glory. What follows takes apart the noble ideals Raina was raised on and replaces them with a clear-eyed practicality that turns out to be far more attractive. First produced in 1894, it was one of Shaw's earliest stage successes and later inspired the operetta The Chocolate Soldier. Its wit still lands cleanly today.

About the author

George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) was an Irish playwright, critic, and socialist polemicist who became the leading English-language dramatist of his era. A co-founder of the Fabian Society, he used comedy to attack social hypocrisy and won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1925.