by Henrik Ibsen
EINAR: That won’t avail
her now. She’s damned.
BRAND [calmly]:
You fool.
EINAR: Both reprobate; both damned;
you – and she whom you named.
BRAND: You dare say that? You who were
sprawled in corruption’s mire?
EINAR: But newly risen without stain!
I was immersed in the divine
wash-tub; pounded by the dolly-
stick of His anger! I was wholly
cleansed on the scrubbing-board of our
redemption, by the soap of prayer!
BRAND: Soap of prayer? Spit it out!
EINAR: I am pure heavenly wheat;
and you, chaff for the fire.
I can smell sulphur here.
I see the devil’s horns.
Exit. BRAND looks after him for a few moments; then suddenly his eyes light up.
BRAND [exclaiming]:
And I have burst the chains
you bound me with! I shrug
them off. From now on I
fight under my own flag
whether or not any
man chooses to follow.
MAYOR [entering hurriedly]:
Brand! Be a good fellow
and hurry up. It’s late
and they’re shouting, ‘Why wait?’
and ‘Start the procession!’,
‘We want Pastor Brand!’,
and so on, in a fashion
most unseemly. They’re
getting out of hand.
BRAND: Then let them, Mister Mayor,
I’ll not chaffer again
with you, or any man
who jumps at your nod.
MAYOR [shouting]:
Keep back, back to the road!
[More quietly]
My dear pastor, I urge
you, wield the scourge,
exert your influence
as a man of the cloth!
We’ll be trampled to death!
Too late! There goes the fence!
The CROWD surges in and breaks in wild disorder through the festive procession towards the church.
ONE OF THE CROWD: Pastor, give us a sign!
ANOTHER: Show us the new Zion!
DEAN [overrun by the mob]:
Use your authority,
mayor!
MAYOR: They won’t heed me!
SCHOOLMASTER: Pastor, for pity’s sake,
don’t just stand there. Is this
the truth you promised us?
Make them see reason. Talk
to them; turn their minds
to higher things!
BRAND: Fresh winds,
fresh winds of change are blowing,
purging and renewing!
[Shouts to the CROWD.]
Here’s where the roads divide;
here you must turn aside
out of the old rut,
to seek the Absolute,
God’s one true dwelling place!
AN OFFICIAL: He’s mad!
A CLERIC: It’s a disgrace!
BRAND: I was mad. I believed
that even you still served
the mighty God of truth.
I set foot on the path
that led to compromise.
I played your petty games;
I walked as you walk;
I talked in your terms.
So, my church was too small.
So, I thought I’d amaze
God Himself with the bulk
of His new citadel.
In my pride I forgot
that the words ‘all or nothing’
mean what they say. The trumpet
of His judgement has shrilled
above this place. I’m filled
with dread and self-loathing,
as David stood accurst
for an unholy lust.
But this much is certain:
the riches of Satan
are our self-betrayals,
are our perjured souls.
ONE OF THE CROWD [in mounting excitement]:
He’s right! We must have been
blind!
ANOTHER: Cast them out!
ANOTHER: Swine!
BRAND: ‘Close behind thee squats the Fiend.
In his meshes thou art bound.
By his wiles thou art possessed,
All thy hardihood laid waste,
Made a stranger to thyself,
Drowned in desolation’s gulf.’
You who go to church to stuff
your souls with solemn fustian,
tell me: was that spiced enough?
Or did it seem un-Christian?
You love the organ and the bells,
love to hear a well-rehearsed
sermon full of little thrills,
trills of dogma nicely phrased,
sacred torrents in full spate,
cascades of the speaker’s art.
MAYOR [aside]:
He’s hit the dean off, loud and clear.
DEAN [aside]:
Surely he must mean the mayor.
BRAND: The candles in the holy place,
the vestments and the carapace
of piety, that’s all you ask:
pantomimes to send you home
deafened, surfeited, and dumb,
fitted for the daily task,
glad to put your souls away
in camphor with your Sunday best,
ready for the next day of rest,
unready for the Judgement Day.
DEAN: Citizens, eschew that man!
He’s not a Christian. Well, I mean,
he spurns our faith!
BRAND: You speak of faith?
That’s long since vanished from the earth.
It vanished when man lost his soul.
It doesn’t answer when you call.
Show me the man who has not cast
spiritual treasure in the dust
and ashes of a wasted life.
Jigging to the scrawny fife,
clown and cripple show their legs,
dance themselves into the muck
of blasphemy before the Ark,25
all drained and bitter as the dregs.
It’s reckoning time: ‘Repent! repent!’
Time for amendment and for cant.
Hey presto, penitence and prayer!
Hey presto, ‘Save us from despair!’
What a sick parade of wretches
lurching towards heaven on crutches,
maimed in body and in soul,
besieging mercy’s citadel!
Yet listen to the voice of God:
‘Give me now thy precious blood,
give to me of thy pure spirit.
Thou art chosen to inherit.
Be then as a little child:
be the child within the man;
flesh and spirit undefiled,
enter into thy domain.’
MAYOR: Unlock the church, then.
ONE OF THE CROWD [crying out as if in anguish]:
No! No!
Pastor, tell us what to do!
BRAND: Jerusalem’s temple, seek it out,
that altar blazing on the height.
It is the earth on which we stand,
the world of Adam reordained.
Let faith be life; your daily work
like David’s dance before the Ark.
Then truth and dogma shall be one,
and body shall belong to soul,
and soul embody the divine,
and majesty shall be the small
child’s wonder at the Christmas game;
shall be the starlight through the storm.
There is movement, as of a storm, among the CROWD; some shrink back; most gather closely around BRAND.
&
nbsp; ONE OF THE CROWD: He brings us light! Drives out the dark!
DEAN: Scoundrel! Seducer of Christ’s flock!
Desist at once, d’you hear?
Have him arrested, mayor!
MAYOR: Not I! I’d be a fool
to fight with a mad bull.
Let him bellow and snort.
Let him tire himself out.
BRAND: Far from this hideous place,
from Pilate, from Caiaphas,26
still shines the promised land
and the unfinished quest.
Here I’m no longer priest.
Snatch this key from my hand
if you dare.
[Throws it into the river.]
I revoke
my covenant. I take
back from you each gift
I ever gave. What’s left
is all yours, child-of-dirt,
feeble-thought, faint-heart!
MAYOR [aside]:
There goes his Knight’s Grand Cross.
DEAN [aside]:
There goes his diocese.
BRAND: You who are still young,
with strength to stay the course,
awake from the dead sleep
of shame and compromise
and dust and squalor.
Listen to the air sing
over summit and steep.
Arise, arise, and learn
what it is to be men
possessed of true valour
in a holy war!
ONE OF THE CROWD: Lead on, pastor, we’ll
follow you anywhere!
BRAND: Follow, then, those who will!
March away across the frozen
crests, across that sea of snow,
to valleys waiting for the thaw.
‘Rouse the captives in their prison,
Topple Dagon27 at his feast;
By your strength and your example
Be the builders of the temple,
Make of every man a priest!’
The CROWD, which includes the SEXTON and the SCHOOLMASTER, surges around him. BRAND is raised aloft on the men’s shoulders.
ONE OF THE CROWD: Such visions!
ANOTHER: Ah, such prophecies!
Like the sun to our eyes!
DEAN [as they begin to leave]:
Visions? Visions? You’re blind!
Led astray by the Fiend!
MAYOR: You hear what the dean says!
Stay put in the parish;
enjoy the good life;
avoid stormy seas,
good people, or perish.
You fools, are you deaf?
ONE OF THE CROWD: Our lives are now the Lord’s!
MAYOR: You wait! You’ll eat your words!
ANOTHER: The Israelites were given
manna from heaven!28
MAYOR [shaking his fist at BRAND]:
Disgraceful! But you’ll pay
for this, come reckoning day!
DEAN: The scoundrel! O my sheep,
my stipend! I could weep.
MAYOR: They haven’t gone far yet.
They’ll soon start to bleat.
He follows them.
DEAN: Hey! Where are you going?
What on earth’s the mayor doing?
Is he out of his mind?
This stirs up my old blood!
I’ll follow them; by God,
I’ll not be left behind.
Exit.
SCENE 2
At the highest pasture of the village. The landscape rises in the background and turns into vast, desolate mountain heights. It is raining. BRAND, followed by the crowd – men, women, and children – comes over the slopes.
BRAND: Look up, look far and high!
Fare forward to your spirits’ home,
you men-of-God! Your dead selves lie
behind you in the valley gloom.
A MAN: My old dad, he’s worn out.
ANOTHER MAN: Gi’e us summat to eat.
A WOMAN: And we’re that parched wi’ thirst.
BRAND: On, on to the crest!
SCHOOLMASTER: But which way?
BRAND: Any road
that gets us there is good.
SEXTON: The Ice Church is up there.
ANOTHER WOMAN: Eh, but my feet are sore.
BRAND: The steep way’s the shortest.
Fight! When you’ve fought, rest.
SCHOOLMASTER: Give them strength; their courage fails!
ONE OF THE CROWD: Miracles, we want miracles!
BRAND: You want! You want! The mark
of slavery’s deep in you yet!
You want profit without sweat.
Press forward; or fall, back-
sliding into the grave.
SCHOOLMASTER: He’s right … we must be brave.
We shall have our reward.
BRAND: As surely as the Lord
turns on us His just gaze!
ONE OF THE CROWD: Hear him! He prophesies!
ANOTHER: Pastor, will the fight be hot
and bloody?
ANOTHER: Oh, I hope it’s not.
ANOTHER: What’s my share when we’ve won?
ANOTHER: Don’t take my only son.
SEXTON: Will the victory be ours
by Tuesday, d’you suppose?
BRAND [looking around the crowd, bewildered]:
What is it? What do you want?
SEXTON: We want the full account.
First: how long will it last?
Second: what will it cost?
Third: what’s the profit for us?
BRAND: So that’s the question!
SCHOOLMASTER: Yes,
pastor. We want the truth,
‘straight from the horse’s mouth’.
BRAND: How long will the strife last?
Till you have sacrificed
all your earthly good,
every last farthing;
till you have understood
what the words ‘all or nothing’
truly mean; till you control
your own strength, your own soul.
What will your losses be?
Ancient idolatry,
and servitude that shines
weighed down with golden chains
and deep pillows of sloth,
your thraldom to earth.
What will the victor’s wreath
be? It will be faith
raised up; it will be joy
in sacrifice; integrity
of the soul; everyman’s
triumph, his crown of thorns!
ONE OF THE CROWD [furiously]:
Judas! We’ve been betrayed!
BRAND: I have kept my word!
ANOTHER: You promised victories –
but talk of sacrifice,
and ask us to lay down
our lives for those unborn.
BRAND: To get to Canaan we must pass
like Moses through the wilderness.
All who keep faith shall walk this road
as victors chosen of the Lord.
SEXTON: Here’s a fine to-do.
We’ll never dare to show
our heads.
SCHOOLMASTER: We can’t go home,
Sexton, think of the shame.
SEXTON: We can’t go on. We’re stuck,
for certain-sure.
ONE OF THE CROWD: Turn back!
ANOTHER: Hey! Stone him, lads!
ANOTHER: Curse
him!
SCHOOLMASTER: ‘Thou shalt not murder.’29
And our plight would be far worse
without a leader.
A WOMAN [pointing back down the path]:
Lordy – the dean – it’s him!
SCHOOLMASTER: Please try to stay calm!
The DEAN arrives, followed by a few of those who had stayed behind.
DEAN: O my flock,
&nbs
p; hear your old shepherd speak!
SCHOOLMASTER [to the CROWD]:
Too late, too late. We’d best
follow the pastor now.
DEAN: You plunge knives in my breast,
you set thorns on my brow!
BRAND: Dean, dean, you’ve tortured souls
year in, year out.
DEAN: O heed
him not, my friends. He’s fed
you dreams and wicked tales.
ONE OF THE CROWD: Ay, that he has!
DEAN: The Church
is ready to forgive
those who show true remorse.
Look deep in your own hearts
and surely you’ll perceive
the black and hellish arts
you’re caught with.
ONE OF THE CROWD: Why, of course!
We were deceived!
ANOTHER: The wretch!
DEAN: What weapons can the humble wield
upon the heroes’ battlefield?
And how, I wonder, would you fare
helpless between the wolf and bear,
between the eagle and the hawk?
The strong prey on the weak,
and you are weak, my lambs.
Go back to your homes.
ONE OF THE CROWD: True! Everything he says!
SEXTON: We locked the village doors
and threw away our keys.
There’s nothing left that’s ours.
SCHOOLMASTER: For my part, I’m prepared
to put in a good word
or two for the priest.
We slept in the past.
He opened our eyes
to a world of old lies;
brought life where there was none.
I say we’ve been reborn!
DEAN: Such feelings will soon pass.
You’ll fold to the old crease,
you’ll plod down the old rut,
I can promise you that.
BRAND: Choose – all of you!
ONE OF THE CROWD: We want –
we want to go back!
ANOTHER: We can’t!
Move forward!
ANOTHER: To the crest!
MAYOR [arrives, running]:
What luck! Found you at last!
Must catch my breath …
A WOMAN: Sir, please
don’t take it out on us,
we never meant no harm.
MAYOR: Be quiet … What a climb!
Listen to me, you’ll all
be rich by nightfall!
ONE OF THE CROWD: Rich by nightfall, he says!
MAYOR: A mighty shoal of fish
out there in the fjord –
millions – all yours to take –
you’ll find they jump aboard –
I’ve never seen the like
in all my born days!
It’s new life for the parish.
Come home with me, good folk!
This is no time for talk!
BRAND: Choose between God and Mammon!
MAYOR: Don’t heed him. Use your common
sense!
DEAN: It’s an oracle
from heaven; a miracle
