Brecht Collected Plays: 6: Good Person of Szechwan; The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui; Mr Puntila and his Man Matti (World Classics)

by Bertolt Brecht

  EVA: So now you’re saying I ought to take Mr Silakka?

  MATTI: Miss Eva, you’re not in a financial position to upset your father.

  EVA: I see, you’ve changed your mind, you’re just a weathercock.

  MATTI: That’s right. Except that it’s not fair to talk about weathercocks; it’s thoughtless. They’re made of iron, solid as can be, only they haven’t got the firm base would let them take a proper stand. Me too, I haven’t got the base. He rubs thumb and forefinger together.

  EVA: That means I’ll have to be careful about taking your advice, if I can’t have honest advice because your base is lacking. Your beautiful speech about my father having my best interests at heart boils down to the fact that you don’t care to risk the money for my ticket.

  MATTI: And my job too, it’s not a bad one.

  EVA: You’re quite a materialist, aren’t you, Mr Altonen? Or as they might say in your world, you know which side your bread’s buttered. Anyway I’ve never heard anybody admit so openly how much he minds about his money and his own welfare in general. It’s not only the rich who spend their time thinking about money, I see.

  MATTI: I’m sorry to have disappointed you. Can’t be helped, though, since you asked me straight out. If you’d just given a hint or two and left it hanging in the air, between the lines, so to speak, then we wouldn’t have had to mention money at all. It always strikes a discordant note.

  EVA sitting down: I am not marrying the Attache.

  MATTI: I been thinking, and it puzzles me why you pick on him not to get married to. The whole lot of them seem alike to me, and I’ve had to handle plenty in my time. They been to posh schools and they don’t throw their boots at you, not even when they’re drunk, and they’re not tight with their money, specially when it isn’t theirs, and they appreciate you just the same way they tell one bottle of wine from another, because they been taught.

  EVA: I’m not having the Attache. I think I’ll have you.

  MATTI: How come?

  EVA: My father could give us a sawmill.

  MATTI: Give you, you mean.

  EVA: Us, if we get married.

  MATTI: I once worked on an estate in Karelia where the boss had been a farmhand. The lady of the house used to pack him off fishing whenever parson called. Other times when there was company he would sit in the corner by the stove playing patience by himself; soon as he’d opened the bottles, that is. The kids were quite big by then. They called him by his Christian name: ‘Victor, fetch my gumboots, get a move on, will you?’ I wouldn’t care for that sort of thing, Miss Eva.

  EVA: No, you’d want to be the master. I can picture how you’d treat a woman.

  MATTI: Been thinking about it?

  EVA: Of course not. I suppose you imagine I’ve got nothing to do all day but think about you. I don’t know where you get such ideas from. Anyway I’m sick of hearing you talk about nothing but yourself the whole time, and what you’d care for and what you’ve heard, and don’t think I don’t see through all your innocent stories and your impertinences. I just can’t stand the sight of you any longer, and I hate egoists, I hate them! Exit. Matti once more sits down with his paper.

  7

  The confederation of Mr Puntila’s fiancées

  Yard at Puntila Hall. It is Sunday morning. On the verandah Puntila is heard arguing with Eva as he shaves. Church bells are heard in the distance.

  PUNTILA: You’ll marry the Attache and that’s that. I’m not giving you a penny otherwise. I’m responsible for your future.

  EVA: The other day you were saying I shouldn’t marry if he’s not a man. I should marry the man I love.

  PUNTILA: I say a lot of things when I’ve had a glass too many. And I don’t like your quibbling about what I say. And let me catch you with that driver just once more and I’ll give you something to remember. There could easily have been strangers around when you came strolling out of that bath hut together. That would have made a fine scandal. He suddenly looks into the distance and bellows: What are the horses doing on the clover?

  VOICE: Stableman’s orders, sir.

  PUNTILA: Get them out of there at once! To Eva: All I have to do is go away for the afternoon, and the whole estate’s in a mess. And why are the horses on the clover, may I ask? Because the stableman’s having it off with the gardener’s girl. And why has that fourteen-month heifer been mounted so young that her growth is stunted? Because the girl who looks after the fodder is having it off with my trainee. Of course that leaves her no time for seeing that the bull doesn’t mount my heifers, she just lets him loose on whatever he wants. Disgusting. And if the gardener’s girl – remind me to speak to her – wasn’t always lying around with the stableman I wouldn’t have a mere couple of hundredweight of tomatoes for sale this year; how can she have a proper feeling for my tomatoes, they’ve always been a small goldmine, I’m not standing for all this stuff on my estate, it’s ruinous I’m telling you, and that applies to you and the chauffeur too, I’m not having the estate ruined, that’s where I draw the line.

  EVA: I’m not ruining the estate.

  PUNTILA: I warn you. I won’t stand for scandal. I fix up a six-thousand mark wedding for you and do everything humanly possible to have you marry into the best circles, it’s costing me a forest, you realise what a forest is? and then you start cheapening yourself with any Tom, Dick and Harry and even with a driver.

  Matti has appeared in the yard below. He listens.

  PUNTILA: I didn’t give you that posh education in Brussels so you could chuck yourself at the chauffeur but to teach you to keep your distance from the servants, or else they’ll get above themselves and be all over you. Ten paces distance and no familiarities, or chaos sets in, that’s my inflexible rule. Exit into the house.

  The four women from Kurgela appear at the gateway into the yard. They consult, take off their headscarves, put on straw wreaths and send a representative forward. Sandra the telephonist enters the yard.

  THE TELEPHONIST: Good morning. Can I see Mr Puntila?

  MATTI: I don’t think he’s seeing anyone today. He’s not at his best.

  THE TELEPHONIST: He’ll see his fiancée, I imagine.

  MATTI: Are you and him engaged?

  THE TELEPHONIST: In my eyes.

  PUNTILA’S VOICE: And I won’t have you using words like ‘love’, it’s nothing but another way of saying filth and that’s something I’m not standing for at Puntila’s. The engagement party’s all fixed, I’ve had a pig killed, that can’t be undone now, he’s not going to trot quietly back to his trough again just to oblige me and go on eating merely because you’ve changed your mind, and anyway I’ve made my arrangements and wish to be left in peace on my estate and I’m having your room locked and you can do what you like about it.

  Matti has picked up a long-handled broom and started sweeping the yard.

  THE TELEPHONIST: I seem to know that gentleman’s voice.

  MATTI: Not surprising. It’s your fiancé’s.

  THE TELEPHONIST: It is and it isn’t. In Kurgela it sounded different.

  MATTI: In Kurgela, was it? Was that when he went to get the legal alcohol?

  THE TELEPHONIST: Perhaps the reason I don’t recognise it is that things were different then and there was a face went with it, friendly-looking; he was sitting in a car and had the rosy dawn on his face.

  MATTI: I know that face and I know that rosy dawn. You’d better go home.

  Sly-Grog Emma enters the yard. She pretends not to know the telephonist.

  SLY-GROG EMMA: Mr Puntila here? I would like to see him right away.

  MATTI: I’m afraid he’s not here. But here’s his fiancée, would she do instead?

  THE TELEPHONIST, acting: Am I mistaken, or is that Emma Takinainen who purveys sly grog?

  SLY-GROG EMMA: What did you say I purvey? Sly grog? Just because I have to have a little alcohol when I massage the policeman’s wife’s leg? It’s my alcohol the stationmaster’s wife chooses to make her famous cher
ry brandy with, that’ll show you how legal it is. And what’s that about fiancées? Switchboard Sandra from Kurgela claiming to be engaged to my fiancé Mr Puntila, whose residence this is, if I am not mistaken? That’s a bit much, you old ragbag!

  THE TELEPHONIST, beaming: Look what I have here, you primitive distiller. What’s that on my middle finger?

  SLY-GROG EMMA: A wart. But what’s this on mine? It’s me’s engaged, not you. With alcohol and ring too.

  MATTI: Are both you ladies from Kurgela? We seem to have fiancées there like other people have mice.

  Into the yard come Lisu the milkmaid and Manda the chemist’s assistant.

  MILK MAID and CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT simultaneously: Does Mr Puntila live here?

  MATTI: Are you two from Kurgela? If so then he doesn’t live here, I should know, I’m his driver. Mr Puntila is a different gentleman with the same name as the one you are no doubt engaged to.

  MILKMAID: But I’m Lisu Jakkara, the gentleman really is engaged to me, I can prove it. Indicating the telephonist: And she can prove it too, she’s engaged to him as well.

  SLY-GROG EMMA and THE TELEPHONIST simultaneously: Yes, we can prove it, we’re all of us lawful.

  All four laugh a lot.

  MATTI: Well, I’m glad you can prove it. To be honest, if there was only one lawful fiancée I wouldn’t be all that interested, but I know the voice of the masses when I hear it. I propose a confederation of Mr Puntila’s fiancées. And that raises the fascinating question: what are you up to?

  THE TELEPHONIST: Shall we tell him? We’ve had a personal invitation from Mr Puntila to come to the great engagement party.

  MATTI: An invitation like that could easily be like the snows of yesteryear. The nobs might well treat you like four wild geese from the marshes who come flying up after the shooting party’s gone home.

  SLY-GROG EMMA: Oh dear, that doesn’t sound like much of a welcome.

  MATTI: I’m not saying you’re unwelcome. Only that in a sense you’re a bit ahead of yourselves. I’ll have to wait for the right moment to bring you on, so that you’re welcomed and frankly acknowledged for the fiancées you are.

  THE CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT: All we had in mind was a bit of a laugh and some slap and tickle at the dance.

  MATTI: If we pick a good moment it may be all right. Soon as things get warmed up they’ll be game for something imaginative. Then we could wheel on the four fiancées. The parson will be amazed and the judge will be a changed man and a happier one when he sees how amazed the parson is, but order must prevail or Mr Puntila won’t know where he is when our confederation of fiancées comes marching into the room with the Tavastland anthem playing and a petticoat for our flag.

  All laugh a lot again.

  SLY-GROG EMMA: Do you think there’d be a drop of coffee to spare and a bit of a dance after?

  MATTI: That is a demand which the confederation might get acknowledged as reasonable in view of the fact that hopes were aroused and expenses incurred, because I take it you came by train.

  SLY-GROG EMMA: Second class!

  Fina the parlourmaid carries a big pot of butter into the house.

  THE MILKMAID: Real butter!

  THE CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT: We walked straight up from the station. I don’t know your name, but could you get us a glass of milk perhaps?

  MATTI: A glass of milk? Not before lunch, it’ll spoil your appetite.

  THE MILKMAID: You needn’t worry about that.

  MATTI: It’d help your visit along better if I got your betrothed a glass of something stronger than milk.

  THE MILKMAID: His voice did sound a bit dry.

  MATTI: Switchboard Sandra, who knows everything and shares out her knowledge, will understand why I don’t go and get milk for you but try to think out a way of getting some aquavit to him.

  THE MILKMAID: Is it true that there are ninety cows at Puntila’s? That’s what I heard.

  THE TELEPHONIST: Yes, but you didn’t hear his voice, Lisu.

  MATTI: I think you’d be wise to make do with the smell of food to start with.

  The stableman and the cook carry a slaughtered pig into the house.

  THE WOMEN applaud by clapping: That ought to go round all right! Bake it till it crackles. Don’t forget the marjoram!

  SLY-GROG EMMA: D’you think I could unhook my skirt at lunch if nobody’s looking? It’s a bit tight.

  THE CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT: Mr Puntila would like to look.

  THE TELEPHONIST: Not at lunch.

  MATTI: You know what kind of lunch it’s to be? You’ll be sitting cheek by jowl with the judge of the High Court at Viborg. I’ll tell him [he rams the broomhandle into the ground and addresses it] ‘My lord, here are four impecunious ladies all worried that their case may be rejected. They have walked great distances on dusty country roads in order to join their betrothed. For early one morning ten days ago a fine stout gent in a Studebaker entered the village and exchanged rings with them and engaged himself to them and now he seems to be backing out of it. Do your duty, pronounce your judgement, and watch your step. Because if you fail to protect them a day may come when there’s no High Court in Viborg any longer.’

  THE TELEPHONIST: Bravo!

  MATTI: Then the lawyer will drink your health too. What will you tell him, EmmaTakinainen?

  SLY-GROG EMMA: I shall tell him I’m glad to have this contact and would you be so good as to do my tax return for me and keep the inspectors in line. Use your gift of the gab to reduce my husband’s military service, our patch of land is too much for me and the colonel’s got a down on him. And see that our storekeeper doesn’t cheat me when he puts my sugar and paraffin on the slate.

  MATTI: You made good use of that opening. But the tax thing only applies if you don’t get Mr Puntila. Whoever gets him can afford to pay tax. Then you’ll be drinking with the doctor; what’ll you say to him?

  THE TELEPHONIST: Doctor, I shall say to him, I’ve those pains in my back again, but don’t look so sad, grit your teeth, I’ll be paying your bill soon as I’ve married Mr Puntila. And take your time over me, we’re only on the first course, the water for the coffee’s not even on yet, and you’re responsible for the people’s health.

  The labourers roll two beer barrels into the house.

  SLY-GROG EMMA: That’s beer going in.

  MATTI: And then you’ll be sitting with the parson too. What’ll you say to him?

  THE MILKMAID: I shall say from now on I’ll have time to go to church Sundays any time I feel in the mood.

  MATTI: That’s not enough for a lunch-time conversation. So I shall add this: ‘Your Reverence, the sight today of Lisu the milkmaid eating off a china plate must give you the greatest pleasure, for in God’s sight all are equal, so say the scriptures, so why not in that of Mr Puntila? And as the new lady of the manor she’ll be sure that you get a little something, the usual few bottles of wine for your birthday, so you can go on saying fine things from your pulpit about the heavenly pastures, now that she no longer has to go out into the earthly pastures to milk the cows.’

  In the course of Matti’s big speeches Puntila has come out on to the veranda.

  PUNTILA: Let me know when you get to the end of your speech. Who are these people?

  THE TELEPHONIST, laughing: Your fiancées, Mr Puntila, d’you not know them?

  PUNTILA: I don’t know any of you.

  SLY-GROG EMMA: Of course you know us, look at our rings.

  THE CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT: Off the curtain-pole at the chemist’s in Kurgela.

  PUNTILA: What d’you want here? Kick up a stink?

  MATTI: Mr Puntila, it mayn’t be the ideal moment, in mid-morning so to speak, but we were just discussing how we could contribute to the engagement celebrations at Puntila Hall and we’ve founded a Confederation of Mr Puntila’s fiancées.

  PUNTILA: Why not a trade union while you’re about it? Things like that shoot up like mushrooms when you’re around the place. I know which paper you read.

 
SLY-GROG EMMA: It’s just for a bit of a laugh and maybe a cup of coffee.

  PUNTILA: I know those laughs of yours. You’ve come round to blackmail me into giving you something, you scroungers.

  SLY-GROG EMMA: No, no, no.

  PUNTILA: I’ll give you something to remember me by all right; thought you’d have a high old time because I acted friendly to you, didn’t you? You’d best clear out before I have the lot of you thrown off the estate and telephone the police. You’re the telephonist at Kurgela, aren’t you? I’ll ring your supervisor and see if that’s the sort of laughs they allow in the public service, and as for the rest of you I’ll find out who you are soon enough.

  SLY-GROG EMMA: We get it. You know, Mr Puntila, it was more for old times’ sake. I think I’ll just sit down in your yard so I can say ‘I was sitting at Puntila’s once, I was invited’. She sits on the ground. There, now nobody can say any different, this is me sitting. I needn’t say it was on no chair but the bare soil of Tavastland about which the school books say it’s hard work but the work’s worth while, though not of course who does the work or whose while it is worth. Did I or didn’t I smell a calf roasting, and wasn’t there some beer?

  She sings:

  For the Tavastlander clasps his country to his heart

  With its lakes and its trees and the clouds above its hills

  From its cool green woods to its humming paper mills.

  And now help me, girls, don’t leave me sitting in this historic position.

  PUNTILA: Get off my land.

  The four women throw their straw wreaths on the ground and leave the yard. Matti sweeps the straw into a pile.