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

PUNTILA: Look, doctor, if they have red patches – and two of them even have black patches – isn’t that scarlet fever in its most virulent form? And what about the headaches they must have when they can’t get to sleep, and toss and turn all night long thinking of their sins?

  THE VET: Then clearly it is my duty to relieve them.

  He throws the prescription down to him.

  PUNTILA: And you can send your account to Puntila Hall at Lammi.

  Puntila goes to the chemist’s and rings the bell hard. While he is waiting there, Sly-Grog Emma comes out of her house.

  SLY-GROG EMMA cleans bottles and sings:

  In our village one fine morning

  When the plums were ripe and blue

  Came a gig as day was dawning

  Bore a young man passing through.

  She goes back into her house. The chemist’s assistant looks out of the chemist’s shop window.

  CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT: You’re busting our bell.

  PUNTILA: Better bust the bell than wait for ever. Kittikittikittitickticktick! What I need is alcohol for ninety cows, my fine plump friend.

  CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT: I think what you need is for me to call a policeman.

  PUNTILA: Come on, my little sweetheart. Policemen for somebody like Puntila Esquire from Lammi! What good would a single policeman be for him, you’d need at least two. And why policemen anyway, I love the police, they’ve got bigger feet than anybody else and five toes on each foot because they stand for order and order’s what I love. He gives her the prescription. Here, my dove, there’s law and order for you.

  The chemist’s assistant goes to get the alcohol. While Puntila is waiting, Sly-Grog Emma again comes out of her house.

  SLY-GROG EMMA sings:

  As we loaded up our baskets

  Down he lay beneath a tree.

  Fair his head, and if you ask it’s

  Not much that he didn’t see.

  She goes inside her house again. The chemist’s assistant brings the alcohol.

  CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT, laughing: That’s a good-sized bottle. I hope you’ve plenty of herrings for your cows for the morning after. She hands him the bottle.

  PUNTILA: Glug, glugglug, O music of Finland, loveliest music in the world! My God, I almost forgot. Here am I with alcohol but no girl. And you’ve no alcohol and no man. Lovely pharmacist, I’d like to get engaged to you.

  CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT: Thanks for the honour, Mr Puntila Esquire from Lammi, but I can only get engaged as laid down by law with a ring and a sip of wine.

  PUNTILA: Right, so long as you get engaged to me. But get engaged you must, it’s high time, for what sort of life do you lead? Tell me what kind of person you are, that’s something I should know if I’m going to be engaged to you.

  CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT: Me? Here’s the sort of life I lead. I did four years at college and now the chemist’s charging me for lodging, and paying me less than he pays his cook. Half my wages go to my mother in Tavasthus, she’s got a weak heart, passed it on to me. One night in two I can’t sleep. The chemist’s wife is jealous ‘cause the chemist keeps pestering me. The doctor’s handwriting’s bad, once I got his prescriptions muddled, then I’m always getting stains on my dress from the drugs, and cleaning’s so expensive. I’ve not found a boy friend, the police sergeant and the director of the co-op and the bookseller are all married already. I think I have a very sad life.

  PUNTILA: There you are. So – stick to Puntila. Here, have a sip.

  CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT: But what about the ring? A ring and a sip of wine, that’s what’s laid down.

  PUNTILA: Haven’t you got some curtain rings?

  CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT: Do you want one or several?

  PUNTILA: Lots, not just one, my girl. Puntila has to have lots of everything. One girl on her own would hardly make any impression on him. You get me?

  While the chemist’s assistant is fetching a curtain rod, Sly-Grog Emma again comes out of her house.

  SLY-GROG EMMA sings:

  Once the plums were stoned and boiling

  He joked condescendingwise

  And thereafter, blandly smiling

  Stuck his thumb in sundry pies.

  The chemist’s assistant hands Puntila the rings off the curtain rod.

  PUNTILA, sliding a ring on her finger: Come up to Puntila Hall on Sunday week. There’s to be a big engagement party. He walks on. Lisu the milkmaid arrives with her pail. Whoa, my little pigeon, you’re the girl I want. Where you off to at this hour?

  MILKMAID: Milk the cows.

  PUNTILA: What, sitting there with nowt but a bucket between your legs? What sort of life is that? Tell me what sort of life you lead, I’m interested in you.

  MILKMAID: Here’s the sort of life I lead. Half past three I have to get up, muck out the cowshed and brush down the cows. Then there’s the milking to do and after that I wash out the pails with soda and strong stuff that burns your hands. Then more mucking out, and after that I have my coffee but it stinks, it’s cheap. I eat my slice of bread and butter and have a bit of shut-eye. In the afternoon I do myself some potatoes and put gravy on them, meat’s a thing I never see, with luck the housekeeper’ll give me an egg now and again or I might pick one up. Then another lot of mucking out, brushing down, milking and washing out churns. Every day I have to milk twenty-five gallons. Evenings I have bread and milk, they allow me three pints a day for free, but anything else I need to cook I have to buy from the farm. I get one Sunday off in five, but sometimes I go dancing at night and if I make a mistake I’ll have a baby. I’ve got two dresses and I’ve a bicycle too.

  PUNTILA: And I’ve got a farm and my own flour mill and my own sawmill and no woman. What about it, my little pigeon? Here’s the ring and you take a sip from the bottle and it’s all according to law. Come up to Puntila Hall on Sunday week, is that a deal?

  MILKMAID: It’s a deal.

  Puntila goes on.

  PUNTILA: On, on, let’s follow the village street. Fascinating how many of them are already up. They’re irresistible at this hour when they’ve just crept out from under the feathers, when their eyes are still bright and sinful and the world’s still young. He arrives at the telephone exchange. Sandra the telephonist is standing there.

  PUNTILA: Good morning, early bird. Aren’t you the well-informed lady who gets all the news from the telephone? Good morning, my dear.

  TELEPHONIST: Good morning, Mr Puntila. What are you doing up so early?

  PUNTILA: I’m looking for a bride.

  TELEPHONIST: Isn’t it you I was up half the night ringing around for?

  PUNTILA: Yes, there’s nothing you don’t know. And up half the night all by yourself! I’d like to know what sort of life you lead.

  TELEPHONIST: I can tell you that. Here’s the sort of life I lead. My pay is fifty marks, but then I haven’t been able to leave the switchboard for thirty years. At the back of my house I’ve got a little potato patch and that’s where I get my potatoes from; then I have to pay for fish, and coffee keeps getting dearer. There’s nothing goes on in the village or outside it that I don’t know; you’d be amazed how much I do. That’s why I never got married. I’m secretary of the working men’s club, my father was a cobbler. Putting through phone calls, cooking potatoes and knowing everything, that’s my life.

  PUNTILA: Then it’s high time you had a new one. And the quicker the better. Send a wire to the area manager right away to say you’re marrying Puntila from Lammi. Here’s a ring for you and here’s the drink, it’s all legal, and you’re to come up to Puntila Hall on Sunday week.

  TELEPHONIST, laughing: I’ll be there. I know you’re celebrating your daughter’s engagement.

  PUNTILA, to Sly-Grog Emma: And you’ll have heard by now, Missis, how I’m getting engaged all round, and I hope you’ll be there too.

  SLY-GROG EMMA and the CHEMIST’S ASSISTANT sing:

  Ere the plums were on the table

  Up he jumped and off he ran.

  Ever
since we’ve been unable

  To forget that fair young man.

  PUNTILA: And now I shall drive on round the duckpond and through the fir trees and reach the Hiring Fair in good time. Kittikittikittitickticktick! O all you girls of the Tavast country, you who’ve been getting up so early year after year for nothing, till along comes Puntila and makes it all worth while! Come all of you, come all you dawn stove-lighters and smoke-makers, come barefoot, the fresh grass knows your footsteps and Puntila can hear them!

  4

  The Hiring Fair

  Hiring Fair on the village square at Lammi. Puntila and Matti are looking for farmhands. Fairground music and noise of voices.

  PUNTILA: I didn’t like the way you let me drive off last night on my own. But as for not sitting up for me, then making me have to drag you out of bed to come here, I call that the bloody limit. It’s no better than the disciples on the Mount of Olives, shut up, you’ve shown me you need watching. You took advantage of my having had a drop too much and thought you could do as you liked.

  MATTI: Yes, Mr Puntila.

  PUNTILA: I’m not prepared to argue with you, you’ve hurt me too badly, what I’m telling you’s for your own good: be unassuming, that’s the way to get on. Start with covetousness and you end in gaol. A servant whose eyes pop out of his head with covetousness at the sight of the gentry eating, for instance, that’s something no employer is going to stand for. An unassuming fellow can keep his job, no trouble at all. One knows he’s working his arse off, so one winks an eye. But if he’s always wanting time off and steaks the size of shithouse seats, then it turns your stomach and you have to get rid of him. I suppose you’d sooner it was the other way round.

  MATTI: Yes, Mr Puntila. It said in the ‘Helsinki Sanomat’ Sunday supplement that being unassuming is a mark of education. Anyone who keeps quiet and controls his passions can go a long way. That fellow Kotilainen who owns the three paper mills outside Viborg is said to be a very unassuming man. Shall we start choosing before all the best ones get snapped up?

  PUNTILA: They have to be strong for me. Looking at a big man. He’s not bad, got the right kind of build. Don’t care for his feet, though. Sooner stay sitting on your backside, wouldn’t you? Addressing the shorter man: How are you at cutting peat?

  A FAT MAN: Look, I’m discussing terms with this man.

  PUNTILA: So am I. I’d be glad if you didn’t interfere.

  THE FAT MAN: Who’s interfering?

  PUNTILA: Don’t put impertinent questions to me, I won’t have it. To a labourer: At Puntila Hall I pay half a mark per metre. You can report on Monday. What’s your name?

  THE FAT MAN: It’s an outrage. Here am I, working out how to house this man and his family, and you stick your oar in. Some people should be barred from the fair.

  PUNTILA: So you’ve got a family, have you? I can use them all, the woman can work in the fields, is she strong? How many children are there? What ages?

  THE LABOURER: Three of them. Eight, eleven and twelve. The eldest’s a girl.

  PUNTILA: She’ll do for the kitchen. You’re made to order for me. To Matti, so that the fat man can hear: What do you say to some people’s manners nowadays?

  MATTI: I’m speechless.

  THE LABOURER: What about lodging?

  PUNTILA: You’ll lodge like princes, I’ll check your references in the café, get lined up against the wall there. To Matti: I’d take that fellow over there if I went by his build, but his trousers are too posh for me, he’s not going to strain himself. Clothes are the thing to look out for: too good means he thinks he’s too good to work, too torn means he’s got a bad character. I only need one look to see what he’s made of, his age doesn’t matter, if he’s old he’ll carry as much or more because he’s afraid of being turned off, what I go by is the man himself. I don’t exactly want cripples, but intelligence is no use to me, that lot spend all day totting up their hours of work. I don’t like that, I’d sooner be on friendly terms with my men. Must look out for a milkmaid too, don’t let me forget. You find me one or two more hands to choose from, I got a phone call to make. Exit to the café.

  MATTI, addressing a red-headed labourer: We’re looking for a labourer up at Puntila Hall, for cutting peat. I’m just the driver, though, ‘tain’t up to me, the old man’s gone to phone.

  THE RED-HEADED MAN: What’s it like up at Puntila Hall?

  MATTI: So-so. Five pints of milk. Milk’s good. You get potatoes too, I’m told. Room’s on the small side.

  THE RED-HEADED MAN: How far’s school? I’ve got a little girl.

  MATTI: Hour and a quarter.

  THE RED-HEADED MAN: That’s nothing in fine weather.

  MATTI: In summer, you mean.

  THE RED-HEADED MAN, after a pause: I’d like the job. I’ve not found anything much, and fair’s nearly over.

  MATTI: I’ll have a word with him. I’ll tell him you’re unassuming, he’s hot on that. That’s him now.

  PUNTILA, emerging from the café in a good mood: Found anything? I got a piglet to take home, cost about twelve marks, mind I don’t forget.

  MATTI: This one might do. I remembered what you taught me and asked the right questions. He’ll darn his trousers, only he hasn’t been able to get thread.

  PUNTILA: He’s good, full of fire. Come to the café, we’ll talk it over.

  MATTI: It mustn’t go wrong, Mr Puntila sir, because the fair will be closing any minute, and he won’t find anything else.

  PUNTILA: Why should anything go wrong between friends? I rely on your judgement, Matti, that’s all right. I know you, think a lot of you. Indicating a weedy-looking man: That fellow wouldn’t be bad either. I like the look in his eye. I need men for cutting peat, but there’s plenty to do in the fields too. Come and talk it over.

  MATTI: Mr Puntila, I don’t want to speak out of turn, but that man’s no use to you, he’ll never be able to stand it.

  THE WEEDY MAN: Here, I like that. What tells you I’ll never be able to stand it?

  MATTI: An eleven-hour day in summer. It’s just that I don’t want to see you let down, Mr Puntila. You’ll only have to throw him out when he cracks up or when you see him tomorrow.

  PUNTILA: Let’s go to the café.

  The first labourer, the red-headed one and the weedy man follow him and Matti to the café, where they all sit down on the bench outside.

  PUNTILA: Hey! Coffee! Before we start, there’s something I’ve got to clear up with my friend here. Matti, you must have noticed just now that I was on the verge of one of those attacks of mine I told you about, and I wouldn’t have been a bit surprised if you’d clouted me one for speaking to you as I did. Can you forgive me, Matt? I couldn’t think of getting down to business if I felt we were on bad terms.

  MATTI: That’s all under the bridge. Just let it be. These people want their contracts, if you could settle that first.

  PUNTILA, writing something on a slip of paper for the first labourer: I see, Matti, you’re rejecting me. You want to get your own back by being cold and businesslike. To the labourer: I’ve written down what we agreed, including your woman. You’ll get milk and flour, and beans in winter.

  MATTI: Now give him his earnest-money, or the deal’s not valid.

  PUNTILA: Don’t you rush me. Let me drink my coffee in peace. To the waitress: Same again, or why not bring us a big pot and let us serve ourselves? What d’you think of that for a fine strapping girl? I can’t stand these hiring fairs. If I want to buy a horse or a cow I’ll go to a fair without thinking twice about it. But you’re human beings, and it’s not right for human beings to be bargained over in a market. Am I right?

  THE WEEDY MAN: Absolutely.

  MATTI: Excuse me, Mr Puntila, but you’re not right. They want work and you’ve got work, and that’s something that has to be bargained over, and whether it’s done at a fair or in church it’s still buying and selling. And I wish you’d get on with it.

  PUNTILA: You’re annoyed with me today. That’s why
you won’t admit I’m right when I obviously am. Would you inspect me to see if my feet are crooked, the way you inspect a horse’s teeth?

  MATTI, laughs: No, I’d take you on trust. Referring to the red-headed man: He’s got a missus, but his little girl’s still at school.

  PUNTILA: Is she nice? There’s the fat man again. It’s fellows like him behaving that way that makes bad blood among the workers, acting the boss and all. I bet he’s in the National Guard and has his men out on Sundays training to beat the Russians. What do you people say?

  THE RED-HEADED MAN: My wife could do washing. She gets through more in five hours than most women in ten.

  PUNTILA: Matt, I can see it isn’t all forgiven and forgotten between us. Tell them your story about the ghosts, that’ll give them something to laugh about.

  MATTI: Later. Do get on and pay them their earnest-money. It’s getting late, I tell you. You’re holding everyone up.

  PUNTILA, drinking: I’m not going to. I won’t be jockeyed into being so inhuman. I want to get on terms with my men first, before we all commit ourselves. I must start by telling them what kind of fellow I am so they can see if they’re going to get on with me or not. That’s the question: what kind of fellow am I?

  MATTI: Mr Puntila, none of them’s interested in that; they’re interested in their contract. I’m recommending that one [pointing to the red-headed man] he may do all right for you, at any rate you can find out. And you’d do better to look for a different job, I’d say. You’ll never earn your keep on the land.

  PUNTILA: Isn’t that Surkkala over there? What’s Surkkala doing at a hiring fair?

  MATTI: He’s looking for a job. Don’t you remember you promised the parson you’d get rid of him because they say he’s a Red?

  PUNTILA: What, Surkkala? The one intelligent worker on the whole estate? Give him ten marks at once, tell him to come along and we’ll take him back in the Studebaker, we can strap his bicycle on the luggage carrier and no nonsense about going anywhere else. Four children he’s got too, what must he think of me? Parson be buggered, I’ll forbid him the house for his inhumanity. Surkkala’s a first-class worker.