Bertolt Brecht: Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder 1

by Bertolt Brecht

  FRAU HOGGE: But it’s our money you’re earning!

  PADUK: But decently, mind you.

  FRAU HOGGE: What d’you mean, decently? You’re taking the bread out of our mouths.

  PADUK: You’ve got wine, and you’ve got it all to yourself now.

  FRAU HOGGE: And my poor girls, what of them?

  PADUK: They’re only poor because they’re your girls.

  FRAU HOGGE: You’re making things very difficult for an old woman like me. Listen: I’m sorry you were thrown out of our house like that.

  PADUK: I was sorry too. But unlike you, I did something about it.

  FRAU HOGGE: You were one of our best customers.

  PADUK: And yet you threw me out because I was temporarily embarrassed.

  FRAU HOGGE: Now tell me frankly, what’s all this nonsense? Why are you exhibiting these disgusting things to people? As if you could change the world.

  PADUK: You know very well that that’s not the point. I simply figured on a way to bring some light into this alley.

  To illuminate your disgusting trade!

  FRAU HOGGE: So it was out of spite? All you wanted was to fix an electric floodlight – looks up – somewhere? And that’s why you staged this farce? All those petitions? The benefactors? Your hestablishment? Just for the floodlight?

  PADUK: I couldn’t very well stand here all by myself and hold it in my hand like a lamp-post. I couldn’t afford that. You yourself said one can’t do anything without money.

  FRAU HOGGE: What a miserable specimen you are!

  PADUK: You overestimate me. It just happened to be a good idea that turned into a blessing for thousands.

  FRAU HOGGE: Yes. We all know you.

  PADUK: Right. I did draw attention to myself.

  FRAU HOGGE: Maltreating my girls so that they come running to me. Howling, half naked. Refusing to pay, kicking up a row, yourself the worst of the lot, a miserable scoundrel we had to throw out – we had to throw out!

  PADUK: And risen from the dead. On the third day resurrected and ascended to Heaven! Creator of a welfare institution! Champion of public morality! Capitalist!

  FRAU HOGGE: Bastard! Pig! Degenerate! Exit into brothel.

  5

  PADUK returning to the table: Baggage. Common, uneducated lot! And all of it just because the Young Workers’ Association is honouring me with a visit! Envy, that’s the trouble.

  A MAN on the left, one of those waiting in the queue: What’s all the fuss with that woman?

  PADUK: May I ask what business of yours that is?

  THE MAN: I’m a public servant. That’s why it’s my business.

  PADUK: Common slander, that’s all it is. Slander to which we pioneers of decency have always been exposed.

  THE MAN: I’ll get someone to look into it tomorrow. This thing’s been built with outside money! Exit unceremoniously.

  PADUK stares after him: Damn. Those fellows have long ears! This could be awkward … But I’ve got the gift of the gab, as that idiot said, and tomorrow my life story will be in the papers. Full of touching details. Hm. Still, it might do no harm to dispel lingering doubts about my high moral purpose!

  6

  Another performance has ended. The Young Workers’ Association comes trooping out.

  PADUK to the chaplain: How did you like it?

  CHAPLAIN: Very much. Pause. But it’s really hell on earth, isn’t it?

  PADUK: Isn’t it? Absolute hell. And all because of prostitution! Padre, if you will permit I’d like to talk to you for a moment. Get it off my chest. For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh, you know … He goes into the tent and reappears with the assistant who is carrying specimen jars which he deposits on the table. Young Workers hover uncertainly. They are joined by members of the queue. During the first sentences of Paduk’s address the alley comes to life. From the brothels issue the girls, singly or in groups of two or three, dressed in sombre street clothes. Some tiptoe towards the fence, others saunter across the alley, giggling noisily. But in the end they all stand gazing silently over the fence.

  PADUK: My dear young friends! You have been shown the dread effects of vice, the horrible diseases that result from prostitution. It is no accident that this hestablishment destined to serve a high moral purpose is situated at this particular spot. It is an act of protest. He notices the girls beyond the fence, climbs on the table, a specimen jar in each hand. My dear young friends! I’m not attacking the poor unfortunates who dwell in these places, I’m attacking the places themselves, I’m attacking their very spirit! I don’t condemn the unfortunate young women compelled like slaves to sell their bodies that were once the work of God – without even being allowed to keep the money. He turns to the girls. Only a brute would turn against them. They are the victims. Their lot is more pitiful than that of carthorses, more harrowing than that of convicts, more terrible than that of the mortally sick. They feel their immortal soul decaying, their body rotting away, they have to comply with the wishes of dirty rotters and degenerate scoundrels, must serve men’s bestial lusts and let themselves be infected with incurable diseases. Holding specimen jar aloft in his left hand. Look at these lips, these rotting gums – once they sang the Lord’s praises in church as loudly as yours did. This ravaged head, like yours it was once caressed by a loving mother’s hand. Above this breast – he stoops to pick up a wax model – now pitted by pus, hung a little golden crucifix, just as above yours. These eyes, or what’s left of them – he stoops and picks up another wax model – bleary, rotting in their sockets; they gladdened a parent’s heart when they first opened, just like yours! Don’t ever forget that! Don’t forget it when temptations whisper and the devil beckons. Perhaps there is still time, perhaps you will be spared, perhaps it is not too late. Be grateful for your chance of salvation. Don’t pile new wrongs on to the old! He steps off the table.

  CHAPLAIN: Very well spoken. Only someone chosen by the Lord could speak like that. We thank you.

  PADUK with specimen jars: Padre, I was only doing my duty. Chaplain extends his hand. Paduk shakes it after putting down the jars. The chaplain and Young Workers file out silently.

  PADUK: No more performances tonight. It’s cleaning time. Goes upstage.

  7

  People disperse. The girls, too, disappear again into the houses.

  PADUK returns, followed by the assistant: Any tips?

  ASSISTANT: A few marks.

  PADUK: Let’s have ’em!

  ASSISTANT: But they’re mine!

  PADUK: They’re not. Don’t be insolent. You’re being paid by me.

  ASSISTANT: Then you can rattle off that junk yourself from now on. Anyway, who wants to work in that smell?

  PADUK: You’re fired.

  ASSISTANT: Suits me. And this time I’ll really go. This time you’ve made a mistake. I’m through. Can’t pay for any fun on those wages. And besides, it turns one’s stomach. I’m through, I tell you!

  PADUK: Are you serious?

  ASSISTANT: Changed your mind again? Naah! This time it won’t work. I’m going inside to pack up. You can keep an eye on your own dirty stuff from now on. He throws the money on the table.

  PADUK: Keep it. You’ve misunderstood me. You’re too touchy, boy.

  ASSISTANT: Naah, this time I’ve had it. For good. And don’t call me ‘boy’. Goes inside.

  PADUK: Damn! What a day! And just when I’ve never spoken better. Now I know what Whitsun means – I was filled with the Holy Ghost. But fortune’s a woman: she protects fools. Sits down. All this hanging around now! On an empty stomach, too! Who can eat in a place like this? I even dream about it. When I think of the time it’s going to take to coach the next one and teach him all those Latin words! Damn drudgery! And on top of it that bloody official! Jackass! Stool pigeon! Turns round suddenly as if struck by apoplexy. Some men have appeared at the brothel door on the right. They ring the bell.

  FIRST CUSTOMER: What the hell’s the matter? Are they closed?

 
SECOND CUSTOMER: As if that damn floodlight wasn’t enough!

  THIRD CUSTOMER: Open up! Or are you all on holiday?

  The door is opened. They go inside.

  PADUK: Wonder what they want. Goes up to the fence. First lot in a fortnight!

  8

  Paduk returns to his table, shakes his head, takes out the cash box and starts counting money.

  FRAU HOGGE right, opens the door, silently crosses the street, listens. Tiptoes through the gate and stands behind Paduk: Enough in the kitty, Mr Paduk?

  PADUK startled, furious: What’s that? Clear off, will you?

  FRAU HOGGE: Don’t lose your temper, Mr Paduk – we’ve got our old customers back again.

  PADUK: Where’s the music, then?

  FRAU HOGGE: Music isn’t just for everyone. Tonight it’s only five-mark customers. But things will improve.

  PADUK: You should know.

  FRAU HOGGE: Listen, Mr Paduk, could you let me have a chair?

  PADUK: That all?

  FRAU HOGGE: Yes. And I don’t want it for nothing, either.

  PADUK locks up the cash box: After all those insults you were hurling at me only ten minutes ago …

  FRAU HOGGE: Since then quite a lot has happened. Quite a lot, I said.

  PADUK: I haven’t noticed anything.

  FRAU HOGGE: In the first place, our old customers have started coming back. One up to me. In the second place, you made a speech.

  PADUK: Right. One up to me. Your powers of observation do you credit.

  FRAU HOGGE: Yours don’t. That speech was rubbish.

  PADUK: Rubbish, was it?

  FRAU HOGGE: Yes. From your point of view. Not from the chaplain’s. But from yours and mine.

  PADUK: Haha. Very funny. Fetches the chair. Here’s your chair. Now will you explain?

  FRAU HOGGE: I will. Sits down. Because I am grateful to you, that’s why. And I wanted to apologize for our little misunderstanding a short while ago.

  PADUK: Let’s get back to my speech.

  FRAU HOGGE: The point of your speech was, if I understand it correctly, that the girls were being exploited. You put that very well. But it isn’t quite correct. Instead of going on and on about those lips that once sang the Lord’s praises, you might as well have mentioned the schnaps they once guzzled – less effective, perhaps, but nearer the truth. Instead of saying how those heads were caressed by mothers’ hands, you might have mentioned the less familiar fact that they were bashed by pimps’ fists. But I don’t want to dwell on that. You know it, anyway; you studied long enough with us. That my business has got to show a profit was correct. Normally my takings are considerably higher than yours.

  PADUK: You’re an excellent speaker. It is a pleasure to listen to you. But why was my speech rubbish? Is that the way to thank me for my chair?

  FRAU HOGGE: Don’t rush me. I’ll break it to you gently. Let’s look at your business prospects first. You’re doing quite well because no one has seen your exhibits before unless he’s been one himself, which is a high price to pay. But no one will visit your show twice – you can take my word for it – and that means there’ll be an end to it some day. You’ll go bankrupt, and my business will restart two weeks after. My clientele numbers about six thousand. Thanks to the educational measures which we immediately put into effect a high proportion have been discouraged from visiting your disgusting, vulgar establishment, with its appeal only to the basest instincts in men, cowardice, and cant. The rest can’t be prevented from letting you spoil the delights of love for them, the greatest delight life has to offer in and out of wedlock; they will avoid us for a couple of weeks, I admit that the loss of revenue is considerable, but nevertheless it is non-recurring. And visitors to our institute always come back.

  Silence.

  PADUK sits across from her at his table, his forehead bathed in sweat: That’s got nothing to do with my speech.

  FRAU HOGGE: Yes, it has. As far as I gather, the idea of your business is to exploit the venereal infection spread by prostitution. That’ll hurt prostitution only as long as you can tell people about it. Then it’ll be over and we’ll flourish as before. The point of your speech, however, was that you wanted to destroy the origin of the infection, prostitution itself. But that means doing away with the source of your own business which flows from it like water from a tap. In short, if you choose to educate the customers about infection, that’s your business. But if you educate my girls, then prostitution will perish and with it the source of infection and you yourself too! Triumphantly yet still anxious: And that’s what you were doing when you sent my girls back to me again, weeping, as you did today. Now wasn’t I right to call your speech rubbish?

  Silence. Paduk is breathing hard. Frau Hogge passes a handkerchief across her forehead.

  PADUK pretends to be unmoved: All right then. Very well. What next? Silence. You talk like a book.

  FRAU HOGGE: I did have a higher education.

  PADUK: All right. So I allowed myself to be carried away, the same as you did. Now what?

  FRAU HOGGE breathes a sigh of relief: At last! That’s better!

  And now I’ll thank you for your chair by giving you a piece of advice: close down and invest your earnings in our business!

  PADUK rises: What’s that?

  FRAU HOGGE: What I said.

  PADUK: And what about my reputation? What about the municipal authorities who let me have the site? What about the interview I gave the paper?

  FRAU HOGGE: Small inconveniences. But think of the results!

  PADUK: I can’t. Because of my reputation. What you’re proposing I had already figured out myself. But it won’t do.

  FRAU HOGGE: What do you mean, your reputation? If you want to go on ruining me – and yourself – I must protect myself as best I can. I’ll have to show up your real motives! With the reputation you’ll have after that, they’ll make you Minister of Finance.

  PADUK: Haha. Very amusing. But what of my marvellous idea? And what about the way you treated me when …

  FRAU HOGGE: I didn’t. Carmen did. And that was when you were still a nobody without cash. Now that you’re my partner, you can do what you want with her. Have you seen the new photos?

  PADUK: No, I’ve been out of touch.

  FRAU HOGGE pulls some photos out of her blouse and shows them to him: That’s Carmen from the back and here she is in profile. And here, very sexy, Ludmilla en face. Full length. Look at those eyes! Those breasts! That mouth! That charming little head!

  PADUK with a jerk: All right. I shall inspect your hestablishment! Takes the cash box under his arm. No more customers now, I’m sure. And anyway, my assistant is still here. Calls into the tent: Just stick around another few minutes, will you? I’m going out on business.

  ASSISTANT from inside the tent: Not another minute!

  PADUK to himself: This place is going to pot anyway. Follows Frau Hogge to the right. Both disappear through the red door. The piano starts up at once. A girl screams. Noise of dancing. The stage darkens. The music fades.

  9

  PADUK enters from the right, his hair somewhat dishevelled, his clothes in disorder but the cash box still under his arm: Let that stupid jackass make his inquiries. I’ll tell him myself. Halts near the table. Hey, you! Where are you?

  ASSISTANT crawls out: You were calling me, Mr Paduk?

  PADUK: Have you changed your mind again?

  ASSISTANT: Only on condition that …

  PADUK: On no condition. You’re fired! Choking with triumph: Get out! Or I’ll toss you out bodily! You exploiter! Rotter! Degenerate scoundrel!

  ASSISTANT: I’ll make you pay for this. I’ll tell the world about you and your past!

  PADUK: You do that, my friend! Tell ’em I’m a brothelkeeper. Tell them I make a hundred marks a day. Run along and tell every man who’s still got something between his legs. Off with you!

  ASSISTANT exits: Bastard!

  PADUK hums the piano melody: Well now, to give the whole thi
ng a bit of tone – climbs up on his table and removes the sign - we might install a projector and show sex education films, we’d certainly get police permission for that. And then, with our contacts, we might get a law passed punishing private fornication with penal servitude and abortion with death! That’d make business boom unbelievably! That’s that, then. Finished. All you need is ideas. Takes the sign off the entrance. Looks around. Grins. Two weeks at most, and business will start up once more. Some of our old customers came back today. Presses the switch that extinguishes the floodlight. Picks up the cash box, saunters slowly, humming, across the stage and disappears right behind the red door. Piano and noise of dancing feet.

  The Catch

  Translator: JOHN WILLETT

  Characters

  The fisherman • His wife • First man • Second man • The six fishermen • The beggar • The beggarwoman

  A fisherman’s hut. Background: left, a window with muslin curtains. To the right of that, more or less in the middle, a curtained bed. To the right of that a fairly heavy square wooden door. A large wooden table in the centre of the room. Against the left-side wall a leather sofa with a net above it. Right, a door.

  It is night-time. The fisherman’s wife is in bed.

  WIFE sleeping uneasily, rolls over and talks in her sleep: Tom! Tom! Leave me alone! … Wakes, and sits up in bed. It must be long past midnight. Not back yet … Didn’t catch a thing today and now he’s on the drink … Oh … Lies down. Oah … Falls asleep. Silence. Then thumps on the door.

  FISHERMAN outside: Hey! Open up!

  WIFE with a start: Tom! Gets out, goes to the door with a candle, opens it and jumps back.

  The fisherman staggers in, supported by two men.

  FISHERMAN angrily: What’s door … locked for? When I get home?

  WIFE wrapping herself: I was asleep.

  FISHERMAN: You see that door’s kept unlocked, damn you. How are people to get in?

  WIFE: What, with me lying asleep?

  FISHERMAN: It’ll be unlocked from now on, I tell you. Staggers to the table.

  FIRST MAN: He’s had a bit too much, Missus. But the three of us made it.