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Arms and the Man by (George) Bernard Shaw
This is a very funny and quirky play by Shaw, outlining the futility of war, and the pragmatism employed by the soldiers fighting it. It also contains a story of rivalry for a woman's hand in marriage, and in the end, yes, the Man gets the girl. It was written in about 1890 and first performed in 1894, but it is almost as fresh today as it was when Shaw wrote it. Captain Bluntschli, a professional soldier, practical and straightforward, with no romantic illusions, brings Raina down to the level of his worldliness and raises her to his level of understanding. Louka, a servant who aims at climbing the social ladder by her (his) cunning, knocks the romanticism out of Sergius. Shaw could not but help to see the funny side of these clashes of personality, while he seriously believed that the world must rid itself of the romantics - that only logical, scientific thinking can produce a sane and peaceful world. Therefore in his play, the anti-romantics win the day. The play was produced by Frank McKone, a regular actor who finally got a gig as a director. He also produced an even older play She Stoops to Conquer a few years later in 1970. It played at Wyong on Friday 11 August and Saturday 12 August 1967. Arms and the Man programme (pdf file, 317,140 bytes) Arms and the Man script (Courtesy of the Gutenberg Project) (text file, 160,886 bytes)
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