Brecht Collected Plays: 5: Life of Galileo; Mother Courage and Her Children (World Classics)

by Bertolt Brecht

  VIRGINIA We should go on with your weekly letter to the Archbishop. Monsignor Carpula to whom we owe so much was all smiles the other day because the Archbishop had expressed his pleasure at your collaboration.

  GALILEO Where were we?

  VIRGINIA (sits down to take his dictation) Paragraph four.

  GALILEO Read what you have.

  VIRGINIA “The position of the Church in the matter of the unrest at Genoa. I agree with Cardinal Spoletti in the matter of the unrest among the Venetian ropemakers …”

  GALILEO Yes. (Dictates) I agree with Cardinal Spoletti in the matter of the unrest among the Venetian ropemakers: it is better to distribute good nourishing food in the name of charity than to pay them more for their bellropes. It being surely better to strengthen their faith than to encourage their acquisitiveness. St. Paul says: Charity never faileth. – How is that?

  VIRGINIA It’s beautiful, father.

  GALILEO It couldn’t be taken as irony?

  VIRGINIA No. The Archbishop will like it. It’s so practical.

  GALILEO I trust your judgment. Read it over slowly.

  VIRGINIA “The position of the Church in the matter of the unrest …”

  (There is a knocking at the outside door. Virginia goes into the anteroom. The Official opens the door. It is Andrea)

  ANDREA Good evening. I am sorry to call so late, I’m on my way to Holland. I was asked to look him up. Can I go in?

  VIRGINIA I don’t know whether he will see you. You never came.

  ANDREA Ask him.

  (Galileo recognizes the voice. He sits motionless. Virginia comes in to Galileo)

  GALILEO Is that Andrea?

  VIRGINIA Yes. (Pause) I will send him away.

  GALILEO Show him in.

  (Virginia shows Andrea in. Virginia sits, Andrea remains standing)

  ANDREA (cool) Have you been keeping well, Mr. Galilei?

  GALILEO Sit down. What are you doing these days? What are you working on? I heard it was something about hydraulics in Milan.

  ANDREA As he knew I was passing through, Fabricius of Amsterdam asked me to visit you and inquire about your health.

  (Pause)

  GALILEO I am very well.

  ANDREA (formally) I am glad I can report you are in good health.

  GALILEO Fabricius will be glad to hear it. And you might inform him that, on account of the depth of my repentance, I live in comparative comfort.

  ANDREA Yes, we understand that the church is more than pleased with you. Your complete acceptance has had its effect. Not one paper expounding a new thesis has made its appearance in Italy since your submission.

  (Pause)

  GALILEO Unfortunately there are countries not under the wing of the church. Would you not say the erroneous condemned theories are still taught – there?

  ANDREA (relentless) Things are almost at a standstill.

  GALILEO Are they? (Pause) Nothing from Descartes in Paris?

  ANDREA Yes. On receiving the news of your recantation, he shelved his treatise on the nature of light.

  GALILEO I sometimes worry about my assistants whom I led into error. Have they benefited by my example?

  ANDREA In order to work I have to go to Holland.

  GALILEO Yes.

  ANDREA Federzoni is grinding lenses again, back in some shop.

  GALILEO He can’t read the books.

  ANDREA Fulganzio, our little monk, has abandoned research and is resting in peace in the church.

  GALILEO So. (Pause) My superiors are looking forward to my spiritual recovery. I am progressing as well as can be expected.

  VIRGINIA You are doing well, father.

  GALILEO Virginia, leave the room.

  (Virginia rises uncertainly and goes out)

  VIRGINIA (to the Official) He was his pupil, so now he is his enemy.

  – Help me in the kitchen.

  (She leaves the anteroom with the Official)

  ANDREA May I go now, sir?

  GALILEO I do not know why you came, Sarti. To unsettle me? I have to be prudent.

  ANDREA I’ll be on my way.

  GALILEO As it is, I have relapses. I completed the “Discorsi.”

  ANDREA You completed what?

  GALILEO My “Discorsi.”

  ANDREA HOW?

  GALILEO I am allowed pen and paper. My superiors are intelligent men. They know the habits of a lifetime cannot be broken abruptly. But they protect me from any unpleasant consequences: they lock my pages away as I dictate them. And I should know better than to risk my comfort. I wrote the “Discorsi” out again during the night. The manuscript is in the globe. My vanity has up to now prevented me from destroying it. If you consider taking it, you will shoulder the entire risk. You will say it was pirated from the original in the hands of the Holy Office.

  (Andrea, as in a trance, has gone to the globe. He lifts the upper half and gets the book. He turns the pages as if wanting to devour them. In the background the opening sentences of the “Discorsi” appear:

  MY PURPOSE IS TO SET FORTH A VERY NEW SCIENCE, DEALING WITH A VERY ANCIENT SUBJECT – MOTION…. AND I HAVE DISCOVERED BY EXPERIMENT SOME PROPERTIES OF IT WHICH ARE WORTH KNOWING….)

  GALILEO I had to employ my time somehow.

  (The text disappears)

  ANDREA Two new sciences! This will be the foundation stone of a new physics.

  GALILEO Yes. Put it under your coat.

  ANDREA And we thought you had deserted. (In a low voice) Mr. Galilei, how can I begin to express my shame. Mine has been the loudest voice against you.

  GALILEO That would seem to have been proper. I taught you science and I decried the truth.

  ANDREA Did you? I think not. Everything is changed!

  GALILEO What is changed?

  ANDREA You shielded the truth from the oppressor. Now I see! In your dealings with the Inquisition you used the same superb common sense you brought to physics.

  GALILEO Oh!

  ANDREA We lost our heads. With the crowd in the street corners we said: “He will die, he will never surrender!” You came back: “I surrendered but I am alive.” We cried: “Your hands are stained!” You say: “Better stained than empty.”

  GALILEO “Better stained than empty.” – It sounds realistic. Sounds like me.

  ANDREA And I of all people should have known. I was twelve when you sold another man’s telescope to the Venetian Senate, and saw you put it to immortal use. Your friends were baffled when you bowed to the Prince of Florence: Science gained a wider audience. You always laughed at heroics. “People who suffer bore me,” you said. “Misfortunes are due mainly to miscalculations.” And: “If there are obstacles, the shortest line between two points may be the crooked line.”

  GALILEO It makes a picture.

  ANDREA And when you stooped to recant in 1633, I should have understood that you were again about your business.

  GALILEO My business being?

  ANDREA Science. The study of the properties of motion, mother of the machines which will themselves change the ugly face of the earth.

  GALILEO Aha!

  ANDREA You gained time to write a book that only you could write. Had you burned at the stake in a blaze of glory they would have won.

  GALILEO They have won. And there is no such thing as a scientific work that only one man can write.

  ANDREA Then why did you recant, tell me that!

  GALILEO I recanted because I was afraid of physical pain.

  ANDREA No!

  GALILEO They showed me the instruments.

  ANDREA It was not a plan?

  GALILEO It was not.

  (Pause)

  ANDREA But you have contributed. Science has only one commandment: contribution. And you have contributed more than any man for a hundred years.

  GALILEO Have I? Then welcome to my gutter, dear colleague in science and brother in treason: I sold out, you are a buyer. The first sight of the book! His mouth watered and his scoldings were drowned. Blessed
be our bargaining, whitewashing, deathfearing community!

  ANDREA The fear of death is human.

  GALILEO Even the church will teach you that to be weak is not human. It is just evil.

  ANDREA The church, yes! But science is not concerned with our weaknesses.

  GALILEO No? My dear Sarti, in spite of my present convictions, I may be able to give you a few pointers as to the concerns of your chosen profession.

  (Enter Virginia with a platter)

  In my spare time, I happen to have gone over this case. I have spare time. – Even a man who sells wool, however good he is at buying wool cheap and selling it dear, must be concerned with the standing of the wool trade. The practice of science would seem to call for valor. She trades in knowledge, which is the product of doubt. And this new art of doubt has enchanted the public. The plight of the multitude is old as the rocks, and is believed to be basic as the rocks. But now they have learned to doubt. They snatched the telescopes out of our hands and had them trained on their tormentors: prince, official, public moralist. The mechanism of the heavens was clearer, the mechanism of their courts was still murky. The battle to measure the heavens is won by doubt; by credulity the Roman housewife’s battle for milk will always be lost. Word is passed down that this is of no concern to the scientist who is told he will only release such of his findings as do not disturb the peace, that is, the peace of mind of the well-to-do. Threats and bribes fill the air. Can the scientist hold out on the numbers? – For what reason do you labor? I take it the intent of science is to ease human existence. If you give way to coercion, science can be crippled, and your new machines may simply suggest new drudgeries. Should you then, in time, discover all there is to be discovered, your progress must then become a progress away from the bulk of humanity. The gulf might even grow so wide that the sound of your cheering at some new achievement would be echoed by a universal howl of horror. – As a scientist I had an almost unique opportunity. In my day astronomy emerged into the market place. At that particular time, had one man put up a fight, it could have had wide repercussions. I have come to believe that I was never in real danger; for some years I was as strong as the authorities, and I surrendered my knowledge to the powers that be, to use it, no, not use it, abuse it, as it suits their ends. I have betrayed my profession. Any man who does what I have done must not be tolerated in the ranks of science. (Virginia, who has stood motionless, puts the platter on the table)

  VIRGINIA You are accepted in the ranks of the faithful, father.

  GALILEO (sees her) Correct. (He goes over to the table) I have to eat now.

  VIRGINIA We lock up at eight.

  ANDREA I am glad I came. (He extends his hand. Galileo ignores it and goes over to his meal)

  GALILEO (examining the plate; to Andrea) Somebody who knows me sent me a goose. I still enjoy eating.

  ANDREA And your opinion is now that the “new age” was an illusion?

  GALILEO Well. – This age of ours turned out to be a whore, spattered with blood. Maybe, new ages look like blood-spattered whores. Take care of yourself.

  ANDREA Yes. (Unable to go) With reference to your evaluation of the author in question – I do not know the answer. But I cannot think that your savage analysis is the last word.

  GALILEO Thank you, sir.

  (Official knocks at the door)

  VIRGINIA (showing Andrea out) I don’t like visitors from the past, they excite him.

  (She lets him out. The Official closes the iron door. Virginia returns)

  GALILEO (eating) Did you try and think who sent the goose?

  VIRGINIA Not Andrea.

  GALILEO Maybe not. I gave Redhead his first lesson; when he held out his hand, I had to remind myself he is teaching now. – How is the sky tonight?

  VIRGINIA (at the window) Bright.

  (Galileo continues eating)

  Scene Fourteen

  The great book o’er the border went

  And, good folk, that was the end.

  But we hope you’ll keep in mind

  You and 1 were left behind.

  Before a little Italian customs house early in the morning. Andrea sits upon one of his traveling trunks at the barrier and reads Galileo’s book. The window of a small house is still lit, and a big grotesque shadow, like an old witch and her cauldron, falls upon the house wall beyond. Barefoot children in rags see it and point to the little house.

  CHILDREN (singing)

  One, two, three, four, five, six,

  Old Marina is a witch.

  At night, on a broomstick she sits

  And on the church steeple she spits.

  CUSTOMS OFFICER (to Andrea) Why are you making this journey?

  ANDREA I am a scholar.

  CUSTOMS OFFICER (to his Clerk) Put down under “reason for leaving the country”: Scholar. (He points to the baggage) Books! Anything dangerous in these books?

  ANDREA What is dangerous?

  CUSTOMS OFFICER Religion. Politics.

  ANDREA These are nothing but mathematical formulas.

  CUSTOMS OFFICER What’s that?

  ANDREA Figures.

  CUSTOMS OFFICER Oh, figures. No harm in figures. Just wait a minute, sir, we will soon have your papers stamped. (He exits with Clerk)

  (Meanwhile, a little council of war among the Children has taken place. Andrea quietly watches. One of the Boys, pushed forward by the others, creeps up to the little house from which the shadow comes, and takes the jug of milk on the doorstep)

  ANDREA (quietly) What are you doing with that milk?

  BOY (stopping in mid-movement) She is a witch.

  (The other Children run away behind the Custom House. One of them shouts) “Run, Paolo!”

  ANDREA Hmm! – And because she is a witch she mustn’t have milk. Is that the idea?

  BOY Yes.

  ANDREA And how do you know she is a witch?

  BOY (points to shadow on house wall) Look!

  ANDREA Oh! I see.

  BOY And she rides on a broomstick at night – and she bewitches the coachman’s horses. My cousin Luigi looked through the hole in the stable roof, that the snow storm made, and heard the horses coughing something terrible.

  ANDREA Oh! – How big was the hole in the stable roof?

  BOY Luigi didn’t tell. Why?

  ANDREA I was asking because maybe the horses got sick because it was cold in the stable. You had better ask Luigi how big that hole is.

  BOY You are not going to say Old Marina isn’t a witch, because you can’t.

  ANDREA No, I can’t say she isn’t a witch. I haven’t looked into it. A man can’t know about a thing he hasn’t looked into, or can he?

  BOY No! – But THAT! (He points to the shadow) She is stirring hell-broth.

  ANDREA Let’s see. Do you want to take a look? I can lift you up.

  BOY You lift me to the window, mister! (He takes a sling shot out of his pocket) I can really bash her from there.

  ANDREA Hadn’t we better make sure she is a witch before we shoot? I’ll hold that.

  (The Boy puts the milk jug down and follows him reluctantly to the window. Andrea lifts the boy up so that he can look in)

  ANDREA What do you see?

  BOY (slowly) Just an old girl cooking porridge.

  ANDREA Oh! Nothing to it then. Now look at her shadow, Paolo.

  (The boy looks over his shoulder and back and compares the reality and the shadow)

  BOY The big thing is a soup ladle.

  ANDREA Ah! A ladle! You see, I would have taken it for a broomstick, but I haven’t looked into the matter as you have, Paolo. Here is your sling.

  CUSTOMS OFFICER (returning with the Clerk and handing Andrea his papers) All present and correct. Good luck, sir.

  (Andrea goes, reading Galileo’s book. The Clerk starts to bring his baggage after him. The barrier rises. Andrea passes through, still reading the book. The Boy kicks over the milk jug)

  BOY (shouting after Andrea) She is a witch! She is a witch!
>
  ANDREA You saw with your own eyes: think it over!

  (The Boy joins the others. They sing)

  One, two, three, four, five, six,

  Old Marina is a witch.

  At night, on a broomstick she sits

  And on the church steeple she spits.

  (The Customs Officers laugh. Andrea goes)

  Methuen Drama Modern Classics

  Jean Anouilh Antigone • Brendan Behan The Hostage • Robert Bolt A Man for All Seasons • Edward Bond Saved • Bertolt Brecht The Caucasian Chalk Circle • Fear and Misery in the Third Reich • The Good Person of Szechwan • Life of Galileo • The Messingkauf Dialogues • Mother Courage and Her Children • Mr Puntila and His Man Matti • The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui • Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny • The Threepenny Opera • Jim Cartwright Road • Two & Bed • Caryl Churchill Serious Money • Top Girls • Noël Coward Blithe Spirit • Hay Fever • Present Laughter • Private Lives • The Vortex • Shelagh Delaney A Taste of Honey • Dario Fo Accidental Death of an Anarchist • Michael Frayn Copenhagen • Lorraine Hansberry A Raisin in the Sun • Jonathan Harvey Beautiful Thing • David Mamet Glengarry Glen Ross • Oleanna • Speed-the-Plow • Patrick Marber Closer • Dealer’s Choice • Arthur Miller Broken Glass • Percy Mtwa, Mbongeni Ngema, Barney Simon Woza Albert! • Joe Orton Entertaining Mr Sloane • Loot • What the Butler Saw • Mark Ravenhill Shopping and F***ing • Willy Russell Blood Brothers • Educating Rita • Stags and Hens • Our Day Out • Jean-Paul Sartre Crime Passionnel • Wole Soyinka • Death and the King’s Horseman • Theatre Workshop Oh, What a Lovely War • Frank Wedekind • Spring Awakening • Timberlake Wertenbaker Our Country’s Good

  Methuen Drama Contemporary Dramatists

  include

  John Arden (two volumes)

  Arden & D’Arcy

  Peter Barnes (three volumes)

  Sebastian Barry

  Dermot Bolger

  Edward Bond (eight volumes)

  Howard Brenton (two volumes)

  Richard Cameron

  Jim Cartwright

  Caryl Churchill (two volumes)

  Sarah Daniels (two volumes)

  Nick Darke

  David Edgar (three volumes)

  David Eldridge

  Ben Elton

  Dario Fo (two volumes)

  Michael Frayn (three volumes)