Collected Plays, Volume 4 (Bertolt Brecht: Plays, Poetry & Prose) 8

by Bertolt Brecht

NEWSPAPER SELLER: ‘Women and children among the wounded!’ Come here and give over swindling. Take a bundle, stand by the other staircase and shout after me. You’ll get a centime a paper.

  He gives him a bundle. The beggar repeats the newspaper seller’s cries.

  BOTH: L’Officiel. Mobilisation of all citizens between the ages of seventeen and thirty-five!

  c

  Night sitting of the Commune. Some delegates are working on papers, others are conferring together, one is giving advice to a woman and child.

  CHAIRMAN: Given that it would be unwise for this assembly to intervene in military affairs and despite the uncertain state of the fighting in and around Malmaison, we shall continue with our deliberations. Citizen Langevin.

  LANGEVIN: Whereas the first principle of the Republic is freedom; whereas freedom of conscience is the first of all freedoms; whereas the clergy have been complicit in the crimes of the monarchy against freedom, I move that the Commune decree the separation of church and state. –Further to that, I urge the Delegate for Education to require all teaching staff to remove from their classrooms all crucifixes, images of the Virgin and other symbolic objects and to hand over all such objects that are in metal to the Mint.

  CHAIRMAN counting the raised hands: Carried.

  CRIES: We hear complaints that wounded communards are being treated negligently by Catholic nurses. – And what about the plan to have reading rooms in the hospitals? For most workers their time in hospital is the only time they get to educate themselves.

  CHAIRMAN receiving a message: Citizen Delegates, Battalion Leader Andre Farreaux, returned from the front, wishes, despite being severely wounded, to appear before you and to make a report.

  An officer of the National Guard is carried in on a stretcher.

  CHAIRMAN: Citizen Farreaux, I invite you to address us.

  OFFICER: Citizen Delegates, Asnières is in our hands.

  Excitement. Cries of ‘Long live the Commune!’ and ‘Long live the National Guard!’

  OFFICER: Citizens, having been wounded and obliged to leave the fighting, I should like now, with the permission of the Delegate for War, to offer for your consideration certain problems which are hampering your troops in their operations and making even the victories very costly. Our men are fighting like lions, but show precious little interest in being properly armed. Since every battery, drawn from a particular quartier, insists on its rights of ownership of its own cannons, we have out of a total of 1,740 cannons only 320 at our disposal for action.

  CRIES: Remember the peculiar nature of our army, without precedent in the history of the world. These people cast their cannons themselves, Citizen Officer.

  OFFICER: Not on their own account, Citizen Delegate. That may be why they can’t deploy them on their own account. Our cannons are being used like muskets or not at all. And everybody wants to shoot but nobody wants to pull a baggage cart. And everyone chooses his own commander and where he wants to go and fight.

  VARLIN: What are your origins, Citizen Officer?

  OFFICER: Graduate of the School of Artillery at Vincennes, formerly Captain in the Regular Army.

  VARLIN: Why are you fighting with the Commune?

  ONE OF THE STRETCHER-BEARERS: He’s for us.

  VARLIN: You know that barely two days ago the Commune decreed the abolition of the rank of general? The officer says nothing. I suppose you wish to suggest we put trained officers in command?

  OFFICER: War is a profession, Citizen Delegate.

  VARLIN: You are doing this with the agreement of the Delegate for War, who has not appeared himself?

  OFFICER: Who, contrary to all the rules of the art of war, is fighting in the very front line.

  RANVIER: Citizen Delegates, I understand this man to be saying that to put an end to giving orders we must ourselves first learn to give them. Citizen Farreaux, we wish you a speedy recovery. Do not misunderstand the silence of this assembly. Silence does not always mean unwillingness to learn. Our difficulties are great, they have never been encountered before. But they will be overcome. The Commune approves your report.

  The officer is carried out.

  RANVIER: Citizen Delegates, you have a victory and you have a true report. Use both. You have the troops, the enemy has trained officers. He has no troops like yours. Overcome your well-founded mistrust of people whom until now you have only ever seen on the opposing side. They are not all against you. Add expert knowledge to the Commune’s enthusiasm and your victory is certain.

  Applause.

  d

  Session of the Commune.

  CHAIRMAN: Citizen Delegates, I interrupt our discussion of the reports on the favourable progress of military operations around Neuilly to read out to you what August Bebel said yesterday in the German Reichstag: ‘All the proletariat of Europe and all who have a feeling for freedom in their hearts, look towards Paris. The war-cry of the Parisian proletariat “Death to want and poverty! Death to idle luxury!” will become the war-cry of all the proletariat of Europe.’ Citizens, I call on you to rise from your seats in honour of the workers of Germany.

  All rise.

  VARLIN calmly: Long live the Workers’ International! Workers of the world, unite!

  10

  Frankfurt. The opera, during a performance of Norma. The door of a box opens. Bismarck in the uniform of a cuirassier and Jules Favre in civilian dress emerge.

  BISMARCK lighting a cigar: Another thing, Favre – I say, you’ve gone very grey, haven’t you? – Here you are in Frankfurt now signing the peace, but what’s happening in Paris, eh? Get that red flag off the town hall, will you? It’s been there long enough. I’ve had a few sleepless nights already over their wretched carryings-on. Damned bad example for the rest of Europe, wants exterminating with fire and brimstone like Sodom and Gomorrah. Hearkens to the music, audible because he has left the door of the box open. Altmann is superb! As a woman too, good build. You know – accompanied in servile fashion by Favre he continues his smoker’s perambulation– you’re a funny crew. You coyly refuse our offer of military assistance, but we’re to let you have your prisoners, by the back door. I know, I know, it mustn’t happen with the help of a foreign power. Like the old song, eh?: ‘Oh Theodore keep your hands off me/Except when no one’s there to see.’ Again he hearkens to the music. Now she’s dying. Magnificent! But then that rabble of ours in the Reichstag want us to hand over Bonaparte. No chance. I’m keeping him up my sleeve, to keep you on a tight lead. Ho, ho! I’ll hand over the common man and he can bleed the comrades in Paris for you. That will be a surprise. War or no war, we must have order. I’ll give the arch enemy a hand, just where she wants it, eh Favre? But we’ll have freed you 200,000 men before long … And by the way, have you got the pennies to pay for them?

  FAVRE: I’m at liberty to tell you now, that was our greatest worry, but it has been settled. The Bank of France. To date we’ve been able to draw 257 million.

  BISMARCK: Well, well. Not at all bad. Another thing: what guarantee have you got that the chums won’t fraternise as they did on 18 March?

  FAVRE: We’ve looked out units we can be sure of, people with a peasant background. And besides, the agitators couldn’t get at the prisoners-of-war, could they?

  BISMARCK: Fine, perhaps we’re over the worst. But as I said, I want action. Understand? I’ve let you delay reparations till after the pacification of Paris. But now be so good as to get a move on. Hearkening to the music. Fabulous, the way she does it. And I don’t want any accidents, Favre, the first cheque goes to Bleichröder, I trust him, he’s my own banker, see he gets his commission, will you? Altmann is excellent.

  11

  a

  Hôtel de Ville.

  It is late at night, the hall is empty. Langevin, who has been no working till now, is fetched by Geneviève.

  LANGEVIN: You complain that there’s no money for school meals. Do you know how much Beslay triumphantly brought back from the Bank yesterday, for building barricades? 11,
300 francs. What mistakes we are making, what mistakes we have made! Of course we should have marched on Versailles at once, on 18 March. Had we had the time. But the people only ever have one hour. Woe betide them if they are not ready when it strikes, fully armed and able to attack!

  GENEVIÈVE: But what a people! I wanted to go to the concert for the ambulance units in the Tuileries this evening. They expected a few hundred, tens of thousands came. I got stuck in a crowd that seemed to have no end. And not a word of complaint!

  LANGEVIN: They are patient with us. Looks at the inscriptions on the wall. 1. The Right to Life. That’s it, but how did we attempt to push it through? Look at the other points. They all look good but what are they in reality? Number 2! Is that also the freedom to do business, to live off the people, to plot against the people and to serve the enemies of the people? Number 3! But what do their consciences prescribe to them? I’ll tell you: what the rulers have prescribed to them, since infancy. Number 4! So is it permitted to the sharks on the stock exchange, the polyps in the venal press, the butcher generals and all the smaller bloodsuckers to congregate in Versailles and discharge against us all the ‘opinions’ guaranteed in Number 5? Is the freedom to lie a guaranteed freedom also? And in Number 6 do we permit the election of deceivers? By a people confused by their schools, their church, their press and their politicians? And where in all this is our right to occupy the Bank of France which holds the wealth that we heaped up with our bare hands? With that money we could have bribed all the generals and politicians, ours and Herr von Bismarck’s as well. We should have put only one point on the statutes: our right to life!

  GENEVIÈVE: Why didn’t we?

  LANGEVIN: For the sake of freedom, which we know nothing about. We should have been prepared, as the members of a body fighting for its life, to forgo personal freedom until the freedom of all had been achieved.

  GENEVIÈVE: But weren’t we anxious not to stain our hands with blood?

  LANGEVIN: We were. But in this struggle the hands not bloodstained are the hands chopped off.

  b

  Session of the Commune. Coming and going of Guards with messages. Now and then delegates leave the session in haste. Every sign of immense fatigue. The busyness subsides as distant cannon fire becomes audible.

  DELESCLUZE: Citizen Delegates, you hear the cannon of Versailles. The final struggle is beginning.

  Pause.

  RIGAULT: In the interests of security I have allowed a delegation of women from the eleventh arrondissement to appear before you to present you, at this juncture, with certain wishes of the people of Paris.

  Agreement.

  DELESCLUZE: Citizens, you have made me Delegate for War. The seemingly limitless task of making good the damage of war, of converting a national war into a social war, and in addition blows from outside such as Bismarck’s handing over 150,000 prisoners-of-war to Versailles, these and other things have not left us time to develop the particular strengths of the proletariat in an area remote and new to them, namely the conduct of war. We have tried all sorts of generals. Those from below, from our own ranks, do not understand the new weapons; those from above who have taken our side do not understand the new men. Our fighters, having just shaken off the tyranny of the factory-owners, will not be commanded as though they were puppets. Their inventiveness and their reckless courage seem to the trained officers to be so much want of discipline. For the relief of Fort Issy our Supreme Commander Rossel demanded 10,000 men by the next morning. Through personal appeals by various delegates 7,000 were got together. So Monsieur Rossel, wanting 3,000 for his round number, rode off, leaving Fort Issy to the Versailles forces who, herded up in their barracks, are always available. What’s more, Monsieur Rossel issues a communiqué to the reactionary newspapers saying that all is lost.

  RANVIER: The great surgeon, needed for the operation, who washes his hands in lysol, or, if there is no lysol, then in innocence.

  DELESCLUZE: Now we have come to the point where all must be decided, and what will decide it is street fighting. Now we must man the barricades, which military specialists despise. Now the people themselves will fight in person for their streets and for their homes. Citizen Delegates, we shall go into the fight as into a job of work, and we shall do it well. Citizens, should our enemy succeed in turning Paris into a grave it will at least never be the grave of our ideas. Loud applause, many rise to their feet. Three female workers are escorted in by members of the National Guard.

  DELESCLUZE: Citizen Delegates, the delegates of the eleventh arrondissement.

  The meeting comes to order. A few delegates come down to meet the women.

  ONE DELEGATE: Citizens, you fetch spring with you into the Hôtel de Ville.

  WOMAN: Have no fear. Laughter. Citizen Delegates, I have a communication for you. It is brief.

  CRY: It’s twenty pages long.

  WOMAN: Quiet, little man, those are only the signatures, 552 of them. Laughter. Citizen Delegates, yesterday afternoon notices were put up in our district urging us, the women of Paris, to be the mediators of a reconciliation with the so-called government in Versailles. We reply: there can be no reconciliation between freedom and despotism, between the people and the butchers of the people. Workers, men and women, belong on the barricades. It was said on 4 September: after our forts, our ramparts; after our ramparts, our barricades; after our barricades, our bodies. Applause. We alter that. After our barricades, our houses; after our houses: mines and booby-traps. Increasing applause. But having said that, we appeal to you, Delegates of the Commune, not to make a spade out of an axe. Citizens, four days ago the cartridge factory in the avenue Rapp blew up; more than forty women working there were maimed, four houses collapsed. The perpetrators have not been arrested. And why is it only the ones who want to who go to work or into battle? Citizen Delegates, this is not a complaint against you, don’t misunderstand us, but as citizens we have grounds to fear that the weakness of the members of the Commune – I beg your pardon, that has been changed – that the weakness of some – I beg your pardon, I can’t read it, it has been crossed out – that the weakness of many … Citizen Delegates, we couldn’t reach agreement on this point. Scornful laughter. Well then, that the weakness of some members of the Commune will bring to nothing our plans for the future. You promised to look after us and our children and I’d rather know mine dead than in the hands of Versailles, but we don’t want to lose them through weakness. 552 from the eleventh arrondissement. Good day, citizens.

  Exit the women.

  VARLIN leaping to his feet: Citizen Delegates, the wives of the Versailles soldiers weep, so we hear, but our wives do not weep. Will you stand idle and deliver them up to an enemy who has never shrunk from violence? We were told in this place a few weeks ago that no military operations were necessary, that Thiers had no troops and in the eyes of the enemy it would be a declaration of civil war. But our bourgeoisie without a second thought allied itself with the enemy of France to wage a civil war against us and was given troops by him, the captured sons of peasants from the Vendée, rested men, inaccessible to our influence. There is no conflict between two bourgeoisies that could prevent them from at once joining forces against the proletariat of one or the other land. And then we were told in this place: no terror, what would become of the New Age? But Versailles is practising terror and will butcher us all so that the New Age will never come to be. If we are flung down it will be because we were merciful, which is to say negligent, and because we were peaceable, which is to say ignorant. Citizens, we beg you, at this late stage let us learn from the enemy.

  Applause and unease.

  RIGAULT: Citizens, if you stopped raising your voices to spare your deadly enemy, you would hear his cannon. Silence in the hall. The thunder of cannon again becomes audible. Do not doubt it, he will be pitiless. Now as he makes ready for the copious spilling of this city’s blood his spies and saboteurs and agents are among us everywhere. He holds up a folder. The names are here, I have been offerin
g them to you for weeks. The Archbishop of Paris does more than say his prayers. The Governor of the Bank of France has a use for the people’s money that he withholds from you. Fort Caen was sold to Versailles for 120,000 francs. In the Place Vendôme, in the rubble of the monument of militarism, the exact plans of our ramparts are openly on sale. Our enraged women fling the agents into the Seine. Shall we fish them out? But in Versailles 235 captured National Guards were shot like rabid dogs and they give our nursing sisters to the firing squads. When shall we begin our counter measures?

  CRY: Citizens, we have discussed this. We decided that we do not wish to do what the enemies of humanity are doing. They are monsters, we are not.

  Applause.

  VARLIN: The question ‘Inhumanity or humanity?’ will be decided by the historical question ‘Their state or our state?’

  CRY: We don’t want any state, since we don’t want any oppression.

  VARLIN: Their state or our state.

  CRY: We cannot except ourselves from oppression if we go over to oppressing. But we are fighting for freedom.

  VARLIN: If you want freedom you must first suppress the oppressors. And give up as much of your freedom as is necessary for that end. You can have only one freedom: the freedom to fight the oppressors.

  RIGAULT: Terror against terror, suppress or be suppressed, smash or be smashed!

  Sounds of great unease.

  CRIES: No, no! – That means dictatorship. – Tomorrow it will be us you smash! – You demand the execution of the Archbishop of Paris and you have us in your sights because we oppose it. – All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.

  VARLIN very loud: And they that don’t take the sword?

  Brief silence.

  CRY: The Commune’s generosity will bear fruit. Let it be said of the Commune: they burned the guillotine.

  RIGAULT: And left the Bank alone! Generosity! Citizens, the Commune resolved to adopt even the orphans of the soldiers killed fighting for Thiers. It supplied with bread the wives of ninety-two who came to murder us. Widows belong to no party. The Republic has bread for all who are in misery and kisses for all who are orphaned. And that is right. But where is there action against murder, which I call the active side of generosity? Don’t say to me ‘Equal rights for those who fight in their camp or in ours.’ The people do not fight as wrestlers or traders fight. Or as those nations which take account of the interests of such traders. The people fight as the judge fights evildoers or the doctor cancer. And still all I’m asking for is terror against terror, even though we alone have the right to terror.