Bertolt Brecht: Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder 5

by Bertolt Brecht

  Mrs Sarti originally died of the plague in scene 5b. The character in 9 was ‘the housekeeper’. This was altered after the first typescript.

  Ludovico, Virginia’s fiancé, did not appear till scene 7 (The Ball). He was then called Sitti, and was not a member of the landowning aristocracy; indeed in scene 9 (Sunspots) he lamented that he had no fortune of his own. His function of introducing Galileo to the principle of the telescope (scenes 1 and 2) was performed by a sillyass character called Doppone, son of a wool merchant, whose only other appearance was, briefly, as a papal chamberlain in the ball scene.

  Virginia was much less contemptuously treated by her father. Her relations with Andrea were friendlier, though her role in the penultimate scene was the same.

  Federzoni the lens grinder did not figure in the play at all. Some of his lines were spoken by an ‘elderly scholar’.

  Vanni the iron founder did not figure in the play either.

  A stove-fitter and a doctor appeared in the penultimate scene.

  In the first typescript the play was called The Earth Moves (Die Erde bewegt sich) and the scenes bore no titles. The title Life of Galileo, together with the individual scene titles, more or less in their final form, are to be found in the revised scripts of early 1939. The verses before each scene are absent from this version.

  The following is a scene-by-scene account of it.

  1

  Galileo Galilei, teacher of mathematics in Padua, sets out to demonstrate the new Copernican system

  Galileo’s long speech about the ‘new age’ (pp. 6–8) was about ten lines shorter, omitting inter alia the passages about the ships previously hugging the shores and about the masons in Siena, but taking in the lines about ‘those old constructions that people have believed in for the last thousand years’ which come at the close of the scene in the final text (p. 17). Andrea’s age was not originally specified, but the revised versions make him thirteen (as opposed to eleven in the final text).

  The whole episode with Ludovico is absent. Instead Galileo explains to Andrea the nature of a hypothesis. Copernicus, he says, knows that the earth rotates

  only because he has worked it out. Actually he doesn’t know it at all. He’s assuming it. It’s simply what is called a hypothesis. No facts. No proofs. They’re being looked for. A few people in Prague and in England are looking for the proofs. It’s the greatest hypothesis there has ever been, but it’s no more than that. Hence the great flaw in the new system is that nobody who isn’t a mathematician can understand why it’s like that and can’t be any other way. All I’ve showed you is that it can be that way. There’s no reason why not, if you see what I mean.

  ANDREA: Can’t I become a mathematician and find out the reason why it should?

  GALILEO: And how am I going to pay the butcher and the milkman and the bookseller if I start giving you lessons for nothing? Off you go, now; I must get on with my work.

  In the revised versions Andrea asks ‘What’s a hypothesis?’ and gets the answer which the final text puts at the end of the scene, down to ‘that can hardly see at all’ (p. 17), concluding ‘Copernicus’s hypothesis is the greatest hypothesis there has ever been, but it’s no more than that.’

  ANDREA: Then what about what the church is saying? What’s that?

  GALILEO: Oh, that’s a hypothesis too, but not such a good one. Lots of flaws that don’t explain very much. But the great flaw of the new system …

  – and so on, as above.

  The episode with the procurator of the university, which follows, is close to the final text, though the reference to the scientific implications of ‘the cry for better looms’ is lacking. Doppone appears after this, and is taken on as a private pupil for thirty scudi a month; his father wants him to become a theologian, since he likes arguing. Before leaving, he tells Galileo about the telescope, which Galileo then constructs from two lenses bought for him by Andrea. The scene ends with them looking through it.

  GALILEO: You didn’t eat the apple – which shows you’ve got the makings of a mathematician. A taste for unrewarding art. I’ll teach you. It won’t break me. This flimflam is worth five hundred scudi.

  ANDREA (after Galileo has allowed him another look): How clearly one sees. Here’s Signor Gambione the bailiff coming up to our house.

  GALILEO: Quick, shove those forty-five scudi in your pocket!

  2

  Galileo presents a new invention to the Republic of Venice

  Federzoni and Ludovico do not figure in this scene, which is dated August 24, 1609. Nor does Virginia. The telescope is handed over by Andrea, who however has nothing to say. The scene starts with Galileo’s telling Sagredo that he has used it to look at the moon. Then his presentation speech is read for him by the procurator, including as Galileo’s own the emphasis on the instrument’s military usefulness; he adds a comment that Galileo hopes to continue serving the Venetians. During this speech Doppone appears and tries to catch the eye of Galileo, who is annoyed and embarrassed: ‘It’s one of my pupils, an unbelievable idiot. I can’t imagine what he wants.’ As the city fathers try the instrument Galileo goes on talking to Sagredo about its relevance to Copernican theory.

  GALILEO (without looking at him): How about this? Flecks of light on the dark portion of the disk, dark patches on the bright sickle. It fits almost too well. Of course, I’m very sceptical, extremely sceptical.

  The scene ends with Doppone breaking through the Doge’s guards and saying breathlessly:

  Signor Galilei, why wouldn’t you listen to me before the presentation? It’s all wrong. The cover ought to be green. It was green; trust Doppone.

  3

  January io, 1610: By means of the telescope Galileo discovers celestial phenomena which prove the Copernican system. Warned by his friend of the possible consequences of his investigations, Galileo affirms his faith in reason

  Up to Mrs Sard’s exit two-thirds of the way through (p. 28) this scene is very close to the final text, the main differences being the omission of Galileo’s six lines on the value of star charts for navigation (p. 25); the fact that Sarti appears ‘in night attire’; and the doubling of Galileo’s eventual salary (one thousand scudi in this version, as against the final five hundred). The episode with Virginia is then shifted to the end of the scene, after Sagredo’s second ‘Don’t go to Florence, Galileo’ (p. 31), which leads to a cross-fade, thus:

  GALILEO: You’d do better helping me write my letter to the Florentines.

  SAGREDO: You really mean to go there?

  GALILEO: Certainly. And with the tube. And with the truth. And with my belief in human reason.

  SAGREDO: Then there’s nothing more to say, is there? He leaves hurriedly without speaking.

  GALILEO laughs as he sits down at the telescope and starts making notes. It gets dark. When the lights come on again it is morning. Galileo is still sitting at his table writing by two candles. He has his coat on, as the fire has evidently gone out. A bell is ringing for early mass. Enter Galileo’s very young daughter Virginia, warmly dressed.

  As in the final text she announces that she is going to matins, though without mention of Ludovico. In her dialogue with her father, which is rather differently phrased here, he does not snub her with such words as ‘It’s not a toy’ (p. 29) and ‘Nothing in your line’, though she complains of never being allowed to look through the telescope. He then tells her to read his letter to Duke Cosimo to see if it is humble enough, and she reads out the text which is now at the end of the scene. They discuss it, and in conclusion he sleepily comments:

  The only way an unpopular and embarrassing man can get a job that gives him enough free time is by crawling on his belly.

  VIRGINIA hugging him: Shall we have a big house there?

  GALILEO: Time, that’s the main thing, my dear, time! Virginia expresses no particular joy about going to court.

  4

  Galileo has exchanged the Venetian republic for the court of Florence. The discoveries he has made
with the help of the telescope are met with disbelief by the court scholars

  The first part, up to the quarrel between the two boys, is close to the final text, apart from the substitution of the court chamberlain for Cosimo’s tutor and the fact that in the earliest typescript Mrs Sarti’s opening speech was about a third of its subsequent length. After that, however, the scene was, in the main, differently written (again, without Federzoni) and incorporated scene 5a, thus reducing the plague scene to 5b only. In this version the reason given for Cosimo’s sudden departure was not the court ball but ‘a particularly important message’, leading the three representatives of orthodox physics to continue the speculations with which they made their original appearance.

  I wonder what sort of message His Highness got? I don’t like those cases of illness in the old town – The message couldn’t possibly have anything to do with that! The medical faculty is quite certain that … There is a knock on the door downstairs. Mrs Sarti opens it. Virginia comes in with a travelling bag (p. 41).

  And so into 5a.

  The preceding argument between Galileo and the three scholars (who in the typescript were simply Professors A, B, and C, before being distinguished in the revised versions as astronomer, mathematician and theologian) is the same in substance, but largely different in form. There is no formal dispute, no attempt to use Latin, no accompanying court ladies, the dialogue is slacker and more repetitive. Galileo’s references to his work with the employees of the Venice arsenal and to the sailors are not yet included (p. 40). On the other hand, he begins his immediately preceding speech with:

  You must realise that it is up to you to set an example and trust your reason. That the meanest stableboy is waiting to be encouraged and challenged to trust his reason.

  The next lines about ‘doctrines believed to be unshakeable are beginning to totter’ were already there in the first typescript.

  The cannibalised 5a is somewhat differently arranged, since Galileo appears at the top of the stairs, chuckling at the scholars’ panicky departure, sees Virginia and asks what she is doing here (when she should be at her convent school). Virginia’s presence in this scene was in fact an amendment to the first typescript, which originally gave her lines to the neighbour’s wife. Mrs Sarti then announced that the neighbour had arranged a carriage to take them all away, but Brecht changed this to The court is sending a carriage’ and added the lackey’s speech which in this version finished with a friendly message from Cosimo to Andrea.

  After Mrs Sarti’s ‘But it’s not exactly sensible’ (p. 42) Galileo adds:

  And I can tell you another reason. In times like these nobody can say how long he’s going to remain alive. He smiles. So let’s go and paint more stars on the lens. Goes into bis study.

  The first two of these sentences were added in pen to the original typescript.

  5b [5]

  Undeterred even by the plague, Galileo carries on with his researches

  Originally, after the old women’s ‘Your mother may be there’, Andrea replies ‘No, she’s dead’. Brecht, however, amended this on the typescript to read as now. Otherwise the differences from the final text are insignificant. Conceivably this scene was a last-minute addition to the first typescript. The numbering and typing seem to suggest it.

  6 [5 on first typescript, 6 in revised versions]

  1616: The Vatican research institute, the Collegium Romanum, confirms Galileo’s findings

  Virtually the same as the final text, apart from the ending, which in the first typescript (later reworded) read:

  The astronomer escorts him in.

  THE ASTRONOMER: That was him, Your Eminence.

  THE INQUISITOR very politely: May I look through the tube? I find this tube extremely interesting.

  7 [6 in first typescript only]

  But the Inquisition places Copernicus’s teachings on the Index (March 5, 1616)

  Though the structure and general gist of this, the ball scene, are the same as in the final version, there are considerable differences in the dialogue. Partly this is due to the fact that Ludovico, who makes his first appearance here, is not specifically identified with the aristocracy or even, in the first typescript, given a surname; hence the absence of the First Secretary’s reference to ‘All the great families of Italy’, with their resounding names. Doppone also makes a last brief entry, speaking jerkily like Mr Jingle:

  GALILEO: I’ve concluded my business here.

  DOPPONE: Yes, I know – known to one and all – brilliant triumph – sat at your feet myself – epicircle and all that.

  Neither Galileo’s verse (Tret not, daughter’) nor the Lorenzo de’ Medici madrigal are included. The old cardinal does not appear, and Bellarmin and Barberini are in different disguises, the former as a fox, the latter as a donkey.

  In Galileo’s argument with these two cardinals some of the key phrases are already there, such as Barberini’s reference to astronomy as ‘the itch’, Galileo’s pronouncement ‘I believe in men’s reason’ (only uttered once however), Bellarmin’s account of the Campagna peasants whose situation can only be justified by positing a Higher Being, and his objection that Galileo is accusing God of ‘the most elementary errors in astronomy’ (p. 55). Bellarmin’s reference to star charts and navigation, however, is once again missing, as is the subsequent bandying of Biblical texts and Barberini’s ‘Welcome to Rome …’ (p. 54) to which it leads. Instead the dialogue runs (after ‘the itch’):

  BELLARMIN: Unfortunately not only have the new theories displaced our good earth, which the Almighty designated as our dwelling place, from the centre of the cosmos, in an almost contemptuous way, but the assumption of utterly incredible distances in the cosmos makes the world seem so tiny that the interest which God evidently takes in the human race becomes almost impossible to understand.

  GALILEO: As the Collegium Romanum has at last admitted …

  BELLARMIN: What we feel is, that to say it’s easier to explain phenomena by positing that the earth moves and the sun stands still, than by accepting the Ptolemaic cycles and epicycles, is a wholly admirable thing, risks nothing and is all right for mathematicians. But suppose one tried to suggest that the sun is really at the centre of our world and rotates only round itself without moving across from east to west while the earth circles round the sun at immense speed, then that would be a very risky affair, don’t you think, because it would upset philosophy and the theologians, who are awkward customers and what’s more it would make the scriptures untrue.

  BARBERINI: But don’t you see, Bellarmin, the scriptures don’t satisfy his reason? Whereas Copernicus does …

  After Barberini, leading Bellarmin aside, has asked Galileo about the possibility of God giving the stars irregular movements, Galileo makes much the same reply as in the final text, but forgets himself and calls the future pope ‘my dear man’. Then the instruction to the secretaries not to take the discussion down comes some two dozen lines later than in the final text, just before Bellarmin formally tells Galileo of the Holy Office’s decision. This is not repeated by the secretary, but in the revised versions Bellarmin on leaving instructs the secretaries to ‘Make a note of the fact that I have today informed Signor Galileo of the decree of the Holy Office concerning the Copernican doctrine’.

  The remainder of the scene, with the inquisitor, is almost as in the final text, except that he enters with two ladies, saying:

  Oh, truly I don’t know half what you do. You’re so much crueller than I ever could be.

  and in asking Virginia about her engagement omits the words ‘your future husband comes from a distinguished family’ (p. 57).

  8 [Transformation scene]

  This conversation with the little monk has no title, and is presumably intended to be played before the curtain. Its general direction, and much of its dialogue, have remained constant since the first typescript, though Brecht continually added to it. Notable differences in the first version are:

  (1) The start:

/>   THE LITTLE MONK: You’re right.

  GALILEO: Haven’t you read the Index Congregation’s decree?

  THE LITTLE MONK: I have read it.

  GALILEO After that you can’t go on saying I’m right, wearing the habit you wear.

  THE LITTLE MONK: I have been unable to sleep for four nights (etc.).

  (2) In the first typescript Galileo’s next speech ran:

  See that man down there hiding behind the oleanders and peeping up now and again? Since the cardinal inquisitor looked through my tube I’ve never lacked for company. They’re very interested in criminals in Rome. I’ll give him one of my tubes to help him observe me better.

  THE LITTLE MONK: Please believe me when I say that I have nothing to do with that man and the people who sent him. I’m a mathematician.

  GALILEO: And I’m a criminal.

  This was removed in revision. Then after the little monk’s long speech about his peasant family, ending ‘a vast goodness of soul?’ (p. 61), Galileo originally went straight to the speech about the Priapus (p. 62). The first part of his comment on the situation of the peasants was added on the first typescript, but not the passage about the oyster and the pearls. The important exchange about whether the truth will out (The only truth that gets through will be what we force through’, p. 63) was added in the process of revision. The ensuing sentence about ‘divine patience’ is not in this version.

  9 [8 or 7 in first typescript]

  After keeping silent for eight years Galileo is encouraged by the accession of a new pope, who is himself a scientist, to resume his researches into the forbidden area. The sunspots