The Soldier
“Bayonet Charge” is a one-person drama, focusing exclusively on a soldier running for life in the heat of the battle, related through an objective third-person perspective. His struggle to avoid being cut down in the midst of flying bullets and the fog of war makes the life-threatening experience visceral, but no details are provided from which the reader can create a portrait of an individual. The soldier is a cipher and a symbol as one has no concept of what he looks like, which war he’s fighting, or even what country he’s fighting for. The lack of any other characters even by reference or collective description ultimately makes the situation crystal clear: the soldier’s enemy is not the army fighting for the other side, but the devastating concept of war itself.
