Heroes

The title of this article is ambiguous. Further meanings are listed under Heroes (disambiguation) .

Helden (original: Arms and the Man ) is a play by the Irish - English playwright George Bernard Shaw . The first performance took place on April 21, 1894 in London's Avenue Theater.

The original title Arms and the Man alludes to the first line of Virgil's Aeneis , which reads: Arma virumque cano ... (German after Johann Heinrich Voss : weapons sound my singing and the man  ...)

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The play takes place during the Serbian-Bulgarian War in 1885. The Swiss artillery captain Bluntschli , who is in Serbian mercenary service, is attacked with his gun by the Bulgarian cavalry officer Sergius and his riders. Since Bluntschli was carrying the wrong type of ammunition, the actually suicidal attack succeeded and the Swiss escaped from the battlefield. He ends up in the house of Raina , Sergius' fiancé . Raina hides the apparently harmless man who makes no secret of his reluctance to war and, like every experienced soldier, prefers to carry chocolate as ammunition in his cartridge pouch. Because he has just run out of the former, Raina supplies him with supplies and lends him a jacket to help him escape. When the captain brought them back at the end of the war, Sergius had already returned from the battle in triumph, and now he challenged Bluntschli to a duel. He knows how to prevent this, however, by threatening to reveal the true course of the battle, namely that Sergius only won because Bluntschli's cannon failed. Because the dashing maid Louka has been stirring up Raina's suspicions in the old warrior for some time, Bluntschli and Raina finally find each other, the maid gets her Sergius, and everything ends in good pleasure.

Performances, adaptations

• In 1908 Oscar Straus wrote an operetta based on the play under the title The Brave Soldier (alternative title: The Praline Soldier ).
• In 1921 , the play was erased in a Burgtheater production (director, main role: Max Paulsen ; evening director: Carl von Zeska ) at the Schönbrunn Palace Theater , Vienna , when all references to a certain nationality were erased in the form of words such as Bulgarian , Serbian , Russian , Bulgaria , Sofia were no longer spoken. The decision was preceded by protest rallies by the Bulgarian student body in the castle theater about the outdated performance of the play. Due to diplomatic intervention , the comedy was canceled after a few performances and the program was changed accordingly.
• In 1958 the play was filmed under the same title, see Heroes (film) .
• In 1972 Udo Jürgens wrote the musical with the title “Helden, Helden” in two acts, which is also based on Shaw's play. It was premiered on October 28, 1972 in the Theater an der Wien with Michael Heltau and Gabriele Jacoby in the leading roles . The response from the critics varied. The musical was also recorded on long-playing record by the Theater an der Wien orchestra.
• In 1986 Max Peter Ammann filmed the book again for Swiss television with cabaret artist Emil Steinberger in the main role of Captain Bluntschli and Friedrich Karl Praetorius as Sergius.

Web links

• Heroes in Project Gutenberg ( currently not usually available for users from Germany )
• Features section. Heroes. In:  Neue Freie Presse , Morgenblatt, No. 20397/1921, June 12, 1921, pp. 1 ff. (Online at ANNO ). .

Individual evidence

1. ^ National demonstration of Bulgarian students in the castle theater. In:  Neue Freie Presse , Morgenblatt, No. 20397/1921, June 12, 1921, p. 13, bottom right. (Online at ANNO ). .
2. ^ The demonstration at Bernhard Shaw's "Heroes". In:  Neue Freie Presse , Afternoon Gazette, No. 20398/1921, June 13, 1921, p. 5 middle. (Online at ANNO ). .
   Repetition of the storm scenes in Bernhard Shaw's "Heroes". In:  Neue Freie Presse , Morgenblatt, No. 20399/1921, June 14, 1921, p. 8, bottom right. (Online at ANNO ). .
   Little chronicle. (...) Demonstration in Schönbrunn. In:  Neue Freie Presse , Morgenblatt, No. 20400/1921, June 15, 1921, p. 6, bottom left. (Online at ANNO ). .
3. ↑ Shaw's comedy “Heroes” is canceled in the Schönbrunn Palace Theater / as a result of diplomatic intervention. In:  Neue Freie Presse , Abendblatt, No. 20400/1921, June 15, 1921, p. 2, top right. (Online at ANNO ). .
4. ↑ Theater and Art News. (...) In the Schönbrunn Palace Theater (...). In:  Neue Freie Presse , Morgenblatt, No. 20401/1921, June 16, 1921, p. 8 middle. (Online at ANNO ). .
5. ↑ Fritz Walden : World Gala premiere "Heroes, Heroes" in the Theater an der Wien: The Balkans begin on Wienzeile . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna October 29, 1972, p. 10 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
6. ↑ Patrick Schröder (Red.): "Heroes, Heroes". In: udofan.com. May 29, 2012. Retrieved February 19, 2013.