Download The conflict between realism and idealism and the rise of the New

The conflict between realism and idealism and the rise of the New Realistic
Drama: A Critical Study of G.B.Shaw’s Arms and the Man
Arup Kumar Mondal
M.A. in English
UGC Net Qualified
The University of Burdwan, Burdwan,
West Bengal, India
Abstract: Theatrical realism was a general movement in the 19th century theatre from the time
period of 1870-1960 that developed a set of dramatic and theatrical conventions with the aim of
bringing a greater fidelity of real life to texts and performances. Through his anti-romantic
comedy Arms and the Man, Bernard Shaw exposes the hard realities about war and love against
their ideal, dreamy and picturesque conceptions. The patriotic ideal or conception of warfare has
been pushed backward by Shaw and he has exposed the realities of war- bloodshed, loss of
young lives, break of family, hunger and starvation and total loss. Similarly, the so-called ideal
and romantic ‘love’ has much sham and pretension lacking in true and genuine heartfelt feelings.
The present paper will investigate upon this conflict between realism and idealism and ultimately
show the victory of realism over idealism which paves the way for a new kind of Modern
realistic drama.
Keywords: Realism, idealism, contrast, war, love, George Bernard Shaw, anti-romantic,
criticism, caricature.
In The Concise Cambridge History of English Literature, George Sampson comments:
“The drama of the nineteenth century had been a world in which there were no vital values. The
melodramas of the bourgeois, the fashionable comedies of society and the close tragedies of the
literary were equally devoid of genuine artistic life. The life of the stage was merely theatrical”.
What we find after the dramas of Goldsmith and Sheridan, a long spell of sterility with libertine
and vulgar audiences, vast and unmanageable auditorium, and weak and undramatic authorships.
At that moment the plays of Shakespeare were chiefly revived. The melodramatic and farcical
plays were borrowed from abroad. There was the lack of originality in dramas. It was with the
production of T.W.Robertson’s comedy Society in 1865, the British drama awoke from its sleepy
and inactive state. It was followed by two other notable plays of Robertson- Ours (1866) and
Caste (1867). Robertson was a realist and he brought naturalism to the British stage. Robertson
was followed by Sir Arthur Wing Pinero and Henry Arthur Jones. After Pinero, there appeared a
more sociological dramatist Henry Arthur Jones who attempted to treat in his plays social and
religious themes. But it is to Ibsen that England owes the resurgence of her drama. The plays of
Ibsen, with their rich flow of ideas and revolutionary views on different moral and social
questions, gave a more vigorous and loftier impulse to the British dramatists. Under his
influence, the drama in England began to treat more intimately and elaborately the serious
problems of actual life. Now as it dealt with actual life, it became a vehicle for the propaganda of
different social, political, economic and religious ideas. Under the leadership of G.B.Shaw, the
drama in England started its triumphal march through the arch of social reality.
According to G.B. Shaw, the power to make the events of the stage real to the audience is
the key to the success of a playwright’s art. The plays of Shaw, like those of his master Ibsen
deal with the things that really matter to the men and women of his age. To critically consider the
play Arms and the Man, we must say that the play was subtitled An Anti-Romantic Comedy in
Three Acts. The suggestion and indication are pretty much clear- the anti romantic treatment of
the so called romantic conception of love and patriotic fervour of war. The title of the play has
been derived from the Roman poet Virgil’s The Aeneid where Virgil celebrated war considering
its sensational and patriotic sides. Shaw, however, going to the exact opposite, criticized the
romantic conceptions of war and love. In a very light-hearted manner, Shaw treats the two most
important factors of human lives.
At the very outset of the play, we come to know that Raina, the romantic heroine is
betrothed to Major Sergius Saranoff who is supposed to be a brave soldier and an ideally
moralistic personality. But at the end, what we find is the very opposite- Raina selects the
realistic, matter-of-fact man Bluntschli. Similarly Louka too dislikes the servility of Nicola and
rejects him as a husband. She ultimately chooses Sergius as her life partner. Through these
apparently impossible episodes, Shaw performs two things. Firstly, it is the reality which should
be considered in the selection of a life partner. Secondly, Shaw, the iconoclast breaks all the
class differentiation prevalent in society.
Bluntschli, the Serbian artillery officer enters into Raina’s bedchamber to escape from
being caught and shot by the Bulgarian army officers. Entering into the bed chamber of Raina,
the man’s voice says, “Sh-sh! Don’t call out or you’ll be shot. Be good and no harm will happen
to you” (Act 1, 21). The soldier frankly confesses, “Excuse my disturbing you; but you recognize
my uniform? Serb! If I’m caught, I shall be killed” (Act 1, 22). He also utters the very basic truth
of life “Well, I don’t intend to get killed if I can help it” (Act 1, 23). Raina’s replies in this
context are tinged with romantic fervour- “Some soldiers, I know, are afraid to die” (Act 1, 23).
The man very realistically makes it clear that it is the duty of every human being to live as long
as he can. One will try his last attempt to save one’s life. The entire conversation makes it clear
that the Serbian artillery officer is Shaw’s mouthpiece who establishes the realistic view of war
and life. Contrarily, Raina is the emblem of all who romantically think about war. It is Bluntschli
who acquaints Raina with the hardcore realities of war. The moment Raina’s false ideas are
broken, she wants to save the soldier and hence she says: “I’ll help you. I’ll save you”(Act 1, 25).
The Swiss soldier informs Raina that he is a professional soldier. He is on the side of the Serbs
because he met them first on the road from Switzerland. He has the pistol with him but it is not
loaded with any ammunition but with chocolates. One may think Bluntschli to be childlike
having no quality to be a soldier. But that is the actual reality which Shaw wants to expose.
Soldiers have to lose their lives in the battlefield for lack of food, in starvation. Shaw’s purpose
here is to show how inhumanly a war is that sends a soldier to a half-dead predicament. Hence it
is the reality that one should carry food item in the battlefield instead of cartridges and
ammunition.
The play contains lots of fun and humours. The man servant Nicola who was betrothed to
Louka was a personality who regards for nothing but the upliftment of his business. He is well
conscious about the closeness of Louka with Sergius. He warns Louka but when Louka doesn’t
listen to his warnings, he instantly decides to regard Louka as his future customer when she will
be married to Sergius. In that case there will be a possibility of the growth of his shop-keeping
business. The servant Nicola humbly behaves towards his master and mistress to please them,
but he has some inner despises for them. Through Nicola Shaw has exposed the truth about
servility. Bernard Shaw being an upholder of social equality breaks the class distinctions. That’s
why in the play Raina’s maid Louka was ultimately married to Major Sergius. Bluntschli, the
middle class Swiss professional soldier got engaged with Raina Petkoff. Shaw also does not
agree with the fact that mere possession of material prosperity, wealth is a sign of personal
upliftment.
To talk about the historical background of the play, we may mention that the Balkans is a
name given to the region which includes Modern day Greece, Albania, Montenegro, Bosnia,
Serbia, Bulgaria and Romania. The Balkans had an exceedingly complex history peopled by a
wide variety of religious, ethnic and linguistic groups scattered through this mountainous
territory in a seemingly random manner. The play is set during the very brief Serbo-Bulgarian
war of November, 1885. In a dispute between the two neighbouring Balkan countries each of
whom felt the other had expansionist designs, Serbia was being backed by the Russian Empire.
Each of the larger powers was supporting the quarreling countries with officer and supplies, the
Swiss provided a large number of mercenaries such as Captain Bluntschli who is profited by, but
cared nothing for, the outcome of the war. Shortly after Serbia declared war in November, 1885
and invaded, Russia called back her officers and Bulgaria was left to fend for herself. In spite of
the setback the Bulgarians were victorious in the Battle of Slivnitza on November 19th.
In the opinion of Levy, “The prime technical innovation with which Shaw is usually
credited is the slaughter of the well-made play”. The sensational theatrical devices of the
romantic plays are not found in Shavian as also in Ibsen’s plays. The new drama rises through
the conflict, no doubt. But the conflict is not between the hero and the villain, between right and
wrong, but between one idea and another. In Arms and the Man, the main conflict is between the
unsettled romantic ideas of Raina and the stern practical outlook of Bluntschli. Again, there is no
conventional sentimental ending in the play of Ibsen and Shaw. The end of the play Arms and the
Man may appear prosaic to many. Bluntschli quickly turns from his suit to Raina to his businessthe affairs of Petkoff’s regiments and his hotels. That is the novelty contributed to the English
dramatic stage by the influence of Ibsen. The centre of interest of the new drama rests not on
“the old catastrophes which left the stage strewn with the dead”, nor on the amorous scenes of
wooing and wedding, but on the realistic situation prompted by the author’s rational approach to
the theme of the theatre. Arms and the Man begins in the fashion of a romantic melodrama. But
that is only a clever device to strike a deep and serious note.
The title and the subtitle of the play hint at the realistic approach of the dramatist. In his
Preface to Plays Pleasant, Shaw frankly states that the title of Arms and the Man originates from
the English rendering by Dryden of Virgil’s Latin phrase “Arma Virumque Cano”. The English
rendering of the phrase is “Arms and the man I sing”. But Shaw’s play doesn’t celebrate the
praise of arms and the man of arms. On the contrary, it is a vigorous caricature of the fictitious
morals of war and romantic soldiering.
The subtitle of the play An Anti-Romantic Comedy in Three Acts is intended for exposing
what is absurd, idiotic and merely theatrical in war and love. Through his three men of armsBluntschli, Sergius and Petkoff- he asserts that successful soldiering depends not on heroic
qualities, but on professional capabilities. His Swiss hero Bluntschli serves to indicate that war is
nothing grand or romantic but a dreadful, though inevitable reality. Shaw’s approach to the truth
of war is powerfully echoed in Bluntschli’s motto of professional soldiering: “I fight when I have
to, and am very glad to get out of it when I haven’t to”(Act 1, 28). Similarly, the romantic
idealization of soldiering is not at all truth and through his romantic soldier, Sergius, Shaw
expresse the grim reality about war and soldiering: “Soldiering, my dear madam, is the coward’s
art of attacking mercilessly, when you are strong and keeping out of harm’s way when you are
weak” (Act II, 47).
Similarly, the romantic idealization of soldiering is highly caricatured through the
presentation of the higher love of Raina and Sergius. This higher love is all absurd and untrue.
Raina and Sergius pose to have higher love and make grand statements and chivalrous poses on
it. Sergius confesses that higher love is a tiresome business and makes love with Raina’s maid
Louka in her absence. Raina is well fatigue of Sergius and feels drawn to Bluntschli, a prosaic
and matter-of-fact character. So in the matter of love also, realism conquers over the idealism.
While Sergius and Raina are his caricature of romantic lovers, Bluntschli and Louka are practical
and matter-of-fact lovers.
The setting of the play too testifies to the full presence of realism in the play. It is not the
romantic moonlit night or the romantic woodland. Of course at the beginning, there is a romantic
background, but gradually it disappears, as the action advances. The curtain drops on the socalled library of the Petkoffs, a place devoid of any scenic romance.
Thus, Arms and the Man is successful in propagating the ideas of realism and ultimately,
realism conquers over idealism. As an iconoclast, G.B. Shaw breaks the unreal, imaginative and
romantic notions and shines the most important aspects of human life with the halo of realism.
And most importantly, the trend paves the way for the new kind of drama- Modern realistic
drama.
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Works Cited
Shaw, G.B. Arms and the Man. Sreebhumi Publishing Company: Kolkata; 2006.
G.Badger, Richard. The Social Significance of Drama. Boston: USA; 1914.
Goldfarb, Alvin, & Wilson, Edwin. Living Theatre: History of Theatre. Boston: McGraud
Hill; 2008.
Smith, Nicola. Analysis of Social Context of Arms and the Man. Fictionno Comments
Print; 2011.
Wikipedia Contributors. “Arms and the Man”. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia.
Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 8 Nov, 2014. Web. 16 Dec. 2014.