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Assess the character sketch of Raina Petkoff.

Raina Petkoff is the heroine of the comedy. Arms and the Man‘. Shaw presents her as the adorer of natural and romantic beauty. She is a romantic girl who is lost in the glory of higher love and war.

Her Romanticism. Raina has studied Byron with her lover Sergius. She is highly romantic for the landscape. She likes to see twinkling stars and snow covered peaks of mountain. She has no faith in formality and status. She has a love for a fugitive who demands chocolates to eat. His child like free behaviour wins her heart, when bluntschli tells about his riches her romantic heart is broken. She rejects Bluntschli’s proposal. She accepts Bluntschli only as a poor man. She is deeply interested in art and literature she loves operas. She helps a fugitive because of romantic feelings and thoughts.

Her Relationship. Raina is betrothed to Sergius. She loves Sergius and keeps a beautiful portrait of Sergius which is the centre of attraction to her eyes in her bedroom. When Sergius returns from war. She calls him. “My hero! My king!Sergius also calls her ‘My queen’.

Her Higher Love. Raina believes in higher love. She worships Serguis. Sergius also wants to worship her. But it is only apparent love. Just after a few minutes. Sergius flirts will Louka, the maid servant. The higher love proves to bea deception. Raina has too given her photograph secretely to Bluntschi. Raina’s love affair with Sergius results in separation. She realizes the truth of higher love.

Her Romantic Love. Bluntschli is a fugitive of war. He takes shelter in Raina’s bedroom and stays there for one night. Finding him hungry and tired she offers him chocolate to eat. He sleeps in Raina’s bed. When Catherine tries to wake ‘The brute’. Raina stops her. “Don’t Mamma, the poor darling is worn out. Let him sleep.” She keeps her photograph in the pocket of the coat with a lovely inscription “Raina to her chocolate cream soldier, a souvenir.” After his departure. Raina thinks of him in her nights. When romance between Raina and Sergius is shaltered. Raina is engaged with Bluntschli.

As An Immature Child: Using the tools of her pretty face and delicate voice. Raina befools her father, mother and lover Sergius. Sher is not fearful of her mother at all, rather governs her. When Catherine appreciates Sergius. Raina tells her irritating. “I sometimes wish you could marry him instead of me.” Raina is a yuoung girl of twenty three but looks like a girl of seventeen. Sergius befools her in the name of higher love and secretly seduces the maid servant Louka. It is her immaturity that she keeps a stranger in the room for hours late at night and gives father’s coat to him and keeps her photo in its pocket. She does not understands the difference between the real life and romantic stories. She does not realize the necessities of life and refuses to marry Bluntschli for he is a rich man. She agree to marry him only when he reminds her of his miserable condition.

Raina and Louka are foil to each other. Raina fails to win Sergius while Louka becomes his wife. Raina is romantically charming, she has not physical attraction while Louka is attractive enough to impress Sergius. Raina represents romanticism while Louka realism.

Conclusion. Thus, Shaw presents Raina as the heroine of the play. Raina’s mother says to her,” will anything even make You straightforward?