Men at Arms

This article is about Evelyn Waugh's novel. For Terry Pratchett's Discworld novel, see Helle Bards .

Men at Arms is a novel by the English writer Evelyn Waugh published in 1952. The story tells the story of a British nobleman in the British Army at the outbreak of World War II . Together with the follow-up novels Officers and Gentlemen (1955) and Unconditional Surrender (1961), the book forms the trilogy Sword of Honor (German: Without fear and blame ), in which Waugh processed his own experiences in the service of the British Army.

Evelyn Waugh received the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 1952 for Men at Arms .

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The protagonist Guy Crouchback, from whose perspective the story is told, comes from a Catholic English aristocratic family. The family is still wealthy, but no longer as wealthy and influential as it was before; In the years leading up to the start of history, Guy was living in a country estate in Italy. With the start of the Second World War, however, he felt obliged to serve his country and fight against fascism.

Thanks to his family's connections, he was accepted as an officer candidate in the (fictional) Halberdier regiment, a traditional regiment of the second rank. The introverted guy would like to play an active role in war as a combat unit commander, but the avenues of military bureaucracy run counter to it.

During his training, Guy moves from place to place in England with the other officer candidates of his regiment; Waugh describes the absurdity of the military bureaucracy in a satirical form. Guy usually has an observing role; he doesn't fit into his surroundings in any way. As a war volunteer he (like the other volunteer officer candidates) is viewed with suspicion by the professional soldiers during their training. He stands out from the ranks of the officer cadets - together with his comrade Apthorpe - because of his advanced age: In their mid-thirties, Guy and Apthorpe are significantly older than their companions, by whom they are disrespectfully addressed as uncles . His denomination, his origins from the upper class, his wealth make him an outsider. Because of his poor eyesight, he is a terrible shot.

His position as an outsider allows him to observe and communicate the processes and relationships in his environment sharply and neutrally. Guy can't get out of his skin, but would like to be a useful commander in combat. The Halberdiers only learn secondhand about the course of the war, the victories of the Germans in France and the rescue of the British expeditionary force from Dunkirk .

He doesn't even have a real affair. When he learns that the Catholic Church still regards his (remarried) ex-wife Virginia as his valid wife, he meets her in London and tries to seduce her; after all, she is the only woman whom he is allowed to attend as a Catholic without sin. Of course she rejects him.

In addition to the well-traveled alcoholic Apthorpe, with whom Guy Crouchback is friendly, the brigadier Ben Ritchie-Hook, an old school warrior, plays a role. In one of the training camps there is a grotesque power struggle between Apthorpe and Ritchie-Hook over the use of a mobile toilet made from Apthorpe's tropical furniture.

After a year without operational use, the unit was deployed in September 1940 to cover the battle of Dakar . According to the operational order, the fighting should be left to the French units under Charles de Gaulle ; they fail because of the resistance of the Vichy-loyal garrison. Ritchie-Hook does not accept this and tries on his own with his men (among them Crouchback as an officer) to take a supposedly unsecured beach and to take Dakar from the north with this hussar blow. The nightly action turns into a debacle, the beach is well secured and guarded, and the British have to withdraw with losses.

The officers are to be brought before a court martial in Great Britain. While waiting for transport back to London in Freetown , Apthorpe dies of the effects of his alcoholism. The immediate cause of his death is Guy Crouchback, who smuggled a bottle of whiskey into the hospital for him according to officers' custom, which Apthorpe empties immediately.

background

Waugh also processed his own experiences during World War II in Men at Arms . Like his hero Guy, he was Catholic, from the upper class, unmilitary in habit. Waugh was also used in the battle at Dakar. Some of the characters in the story are also based on real people. After he had completed the two subsequent novels of the trilogy, he revised them and published them under the title Sword of Honor .

reception

Evely Waugh received the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for his work . Penelope Lively referred to the Sword of Honor novels in an article for The Atlantic as Waugh's masterpiece , also compared to the much better known reunion with Brideshead .

expenditure

• English: Men at Arms , Penguin Classics, London 2001, ISBN 978-0141185736
• German: Without fear and blame , trans. by Werner Peterich, Knaus, Hamburg 1979; revised new edition by Diogenes, Zurich 2016, ISBN 978-3257069655

swell

• Penelope Lively, A Maverick Historian , in: The Atlantic February 2001, online