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Namgung, Jae. “Shaw’s Arms and the Man: Reading the Seriousness of Comedy.” Studies
on English Language and Literature. 33.3(2007): 17-33. Shaw had turned to the humor as a vehicle for thought. The tightly knit humor of incident and character in Arms and the Man has tended to obscure the more inclusive range of Shaw’s artistic achievement in the play. Therefore this article intends to contemplate the seriousness of comedy through the thought, the spirit of prosaicness audiences who are prone to take the humor can pass over easily. The play develops three major themes. First, there is the satire on war, its heroics represented by Sergius, its prosaicness by Bluntschli. This brings into focus both the nature of the individual soldier and the tactics and psychology of warfare. Second, there is the satire on the nature of the genteel classes, on what comprises a lady, a gentleman, and servant. Third, there is an exploration of the spectrum of human disposition which ranges from the romantic to the prosaic. The themes run concurrently, coalescing at last in Act Ⅲ in terms of paradox. Illusions about war, gentility, and love are ultimately given their true perspective through prosaic awareness, but at the same time Shaw reveals with artistic sensitivity that such awareness is most vitally attached to life when it is combined with the incentive power of romance. (Yewon Arts University)