Rada: A Drama of War in One Act

In Short

Set in a Balkan village on Christmas Eve, this one-act drama follows Rada, a doctor’s wife, as she attempts to protect her twelve-year-old daughter, Subka, from the drunken soldiers quartered in her home. While the soldiers drink, loot, and spout nationalist justifications for their violence, the half-witted schoolmaster Nanko provides a chilling, detached commentary on the "necessity" of slaughter. It is a bleak, uncompromising tragedy that exposes the hollow hypocrisy of those who champion war while celebrating the holy season of peace.

The Story

The play opens in the guest room of a Balkan doctor’s home. The village has been seized by an enemy army, and two soldiers, Arram and Michael, have occupied the house. Rada is paralyzed by grief, mourning her husband—whom the soldiers have already murdered—while Nanko, a man who has lost his grip on reality, sits by the fire, obsessively reciting pseudo-philosophical platitudes about the "survival of the fittest."

Rada’s terror centers on the bedroom where her daughter, Subka, is sleeping. When the soldiers demand to know what is hidden behind the door, Rada tries to distract them with food and lies, but her facade crumbles when Subka wanders into the room. The soldiers, initially amused by the child, begin to mock her and treat her presence as a cruel game. They adorn a Christmas tree with a stolen revolver and a wedding ring taken from the corpse of Subka's father, forcing the girl to participate in their grim parody of a holiday celebration.

As the night deepens, the drunken soldiers outside the house become increasingly violent, demanding access to the women inside. When the men at the door begin to break it down, Rada realizes her daughter’s fate is sealed. She snatches the revolver from the Christmas tree and retreats into the bedroom with Subka, locking the door. The soldiers press forward, their lust and aggression overriding all reason. Just as they are about to force their way in, two gunshots ring out from behind the door. The soldiers are momentarily stunned, but the arrival of a real military engagement outside draws them away from the house to the front lines.

In the aftermath, the room is left empty save for Nanko. The old schoolmaster, still oblivious to the gravity of his situation, continues to eat the Christmas plums and marvel at the objects left behind. He accidentally triggers the gramophone, which begins to play a solemn, stirring rendition of "Adeste, Fideles." As the chorus of monks fills the room with the sounds of Christmas, Nanko notices a dark, spreading pool of blood seeping from beneath the bedroom door. The horror finally breaks through his confusion; he touches the blood, stares at his red-stained hand, and whispers, "It's true!" as the sounds of war continue to boom in the distance.

How It Unfolds

The occupation begins Two soldiers occupy the home of a grieving woman, drinking and bragging about the slaughter they have committed throughout the day. Rada remains silent and terrified while the village schoolmaster, Nanko, justifies their actions as part of a natural, evolutionary struggle.

The game of terror The soldiers discover Rada has a daughter and force the child to participate in a grotesque Christmas celebration. They use the husband’s ring and a pistol to decorate a tree, turning a symbol of peace into a display of their own violence.

The broken sanctuary The soldiers outside the house grow restless and demand entry, forcing the men inside to choose between restraint and joining the pack. Rada, realizing the soldiers are about to violate her sanctuary, arms herself with the revolver to save her daughter from a far worse fate.

The final silence After shots are heard from the bedroom, the soldiers are distracted by the outbreak of a genuine military attack and abandon the house. Nanko is left alone in the quiet, finally realizing the reality of the tragedy when the gramophone music plays over the sight of blood on the floor.

The People

Rada is a mother pushed to the absolute edge of human endurance. Her primary desire is the protection of her daughter, Subka, from the dehumanizing violence of the soldiers. She is defined by her desperate bravery and her refusal to allow her child to be used as a toy for the victors.

Subka is a twelve-year-old girl whose innocence is the focal point of the play’s tragedy. She enters the room expecting a traditional Christmas, and her confusion—initially believing the soldiers are Santa Claus—serves to highlight the contrast between a child’s world and the grim reality of the war-torn village.

Arram and Michael represent the casual, predatory nature of the occupying force. They are not caricatures of evil but men who have become desensitized, using "survival of the fittest" rhetoric to wash their hands of the atrocities they commit. They ultimately care more about their own comfort than the lives of those they destroy.

Nanko is a cautionary figure of the intellectual who has lost his moral compass. As a former schoolmaster, he uses his education to sanitize the carnage, treating the war as a scientific experiment. He serves as the play’s most chilling element, as he remains detached from the horror until he is forced to confront the literal blood on his hands.

In Its Own Voice

"He lay there on his back Howling like a wolf, with his belly blown out. I put him out of his misery." An occupying soldier describes the callous murder of the doctor, Rada’s husband, to justify his own presence in the home.

"And war they tell me is a noble thing; It is the mother of heroic deeds, The nurse of honour, manhood." Rada uses the soldiers’ own propaganda against them as she confronts them with a revolver, highlighting the disparity between their romanticized view of war and the reality of her suffering.

What It's Really About

This work serves as a fierce, direct polemic against the glorification of conflict. It challenges the reader to look past the "heroic" narratives often used by states to justify the destruction of families and the slaughter of innocents. The central argument is that war is not a natural or noble condition, but a failure of humanity that requires the systematic indoctrination of people—like Nanko—to ignore the suffering right in front of them. The play asks if "civilization" has any meaning when its highest tools, like music and law, are used to mask the blood that inevitably seeps onto the floor of every home touched by the machinery of battle.

Why Read It Today

This play remains a powerful, if difficult, piece of anti-war literature. Readers who value concise, high-stakes drama will find the one-act structure remarkably effective at generating tension. The writing is direct and unflinching, eschewing sentimentality in favor of a cold look at the psychological toll of occupation. It is not an easy read; the dialogue is infused with a period-specific, grim irony that captures the horror of the Balkan conflicts of the early 20th century.

What lingers is the devastating contrast between the mechanical, recorded music of the church and the reality of the slaughter in the next room. It is a work that does not allow the reader to look away, demanding an acknowledgment of the fact that "peace on earth" is a fragile, often abandoned ideal. Those interested in the history of humanitarian drama or who are looking for a short, punchy, and deeply sobering experience will find this an essential, if haunting, text. Its focus on the domestic sphere, rather than the battlefield, makes its message about the cost of war uniquely personal and enduring.