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

  Creon, son of Menoeceus

  We always followed you. And there was

  Good order in the city and you kept off our throats

  Our enemies here under the Theban roof

  A rapacious populace that has nothing and is provided for

  in war

  And those who live on discord, the loud mouths

  Lean and hungry, long in the wind, in the marketplace

  Speaking because they are paid to or not paid to.

  Now they are loud in the mouth again and have

  A dubious subject too. Son of Menoeceus, have you

  perhaps

  Broached an enormity?

  CREON:

  When I went against Argos

  Who was it sent me? Metal in the spears

  Went after metal in the mountains

  At your bidding. For Argos

  Is rich in metals.

  ELDERS:

  And therefore rich in spears, it seems. We heard

  Many a bad thing from there and dismissed it with

  The messengers, trusting you, and stopped our ears

  Fearful of fear. And shut our eyes when you drew in

  The reins tighter. Only one more

  Drawing in of the reins and one more battle

  You said, does it need, but now

  You are beginning to treat with us

  As with the enemy. And cruelly

  Waging a double war.

  CREON:

  Yours!

  ELDERS:

  Yours!

  CREON:

  Once I’ve got Argos

  No doubt it will have been yours again. Enough.

  So she, in her revolt

  Has muddled you and those who listened to her.

  ELDERS:

  Certainly the sister had a right to bring home her brother.

  CREON:

  Certainly the captain had a right to chastise a traitor.

  ELDERS:

  Asserted to the bone, this right and that flings us into the

  abyss.

  CREON:

  War makes new rights.

  ELDERS:

  And lives on the old.

  War eats itself not given what it needs.

  CREON:

  Ungrateful, all of you. You eat the meats but

  Don’t like the bloody aprons of the cooks. I gave you

  Sandalwood for your houses which the din

  Of swords never enters, but it grew in Argos.

  And no one has sent me back the ore

  I fetched from Argos, but bending over it

  You blather of butchery there and lament my brutality.

  I’m used to greater indignation if the loot is late.

  ELDERS:

  How long, tell us, will you have Thebes go without her

  men?

  CREON:

  Until her men have won rich Argos for her.

  ELDERS:

  Unlucky man, before they are lost, recall them.

  CREON:

  Empty-handed? You answer for it then.

  ELDERS:

  With empty hands or none, whatever’s still flesh and blood.

  CREON:

  So I will. Soon Argos will fall. Then I will call them.

  And my firstborn, Megareus, will bring them to you.

  And be sure that your doors and portals are not too small –

  High enough only for such as are low in their ways –

  Or the shoulders of men of a larger stature might stave in

  Here the gates of a palace and there a treasury door.

  And perhaps their joy when they see you again will be such

  When they grip you they’ll shake your hands and your

  arms

  Right out of the sockets. And when the armour presses

  Boisterously against your fearful hearts beware of your

  ribs.

  For on that joyful day you will see more naked iron

  Than you did in the days of grief. Many a hesitant victor

  Has gone in garlands of chains and danced with collapsing

  knees.

  ELDERS:

  Wretch, are you theatening us with our own? Are you

  goading

  Our own on us now?

  CREON:

  I will

  Discuss it with my son, with Megareus.

  Enter a messenger from the battle.

  MESSENGER:

  Stiffen your neck, sir. I am sent here

  By disaster. Stop the hasty celebrations

  Of victory too soon credited. In another battle

  Your army is beaten before Argos, and in flight.

  Your son Megareus is done with. He lies

  In pieces on the hard ground of Argos. When you

  Acted to punish Polynices’ flight

  And seized and hanged in public the many in the army

  This aggrieved and you yourself

  Had hurried back to Thebes, thereupon

  Your firstborn drove us forward once again.

  Our stormtroops, not having slept enough after

  The bloodbath in their own ranks, raised only wearily

  Their axes wet still with the blood of Thebans

  Against the people of Argos. And there were all too many

  Faces turned back on Megareus who

  To be more terrible to them than the enemy

  Goading them on, his voice was perhaps too harsh.

  And yet the luck of battle seemed with us at first.

  Fighting begets, of course, the love of fighting

  Blood smells the same, yours or another’s blood

  And makes you drunk. What bravery can’t do

  Fear can. But the terrain

  And gear and rations count for something.

  And, sir, the people of Argos fought a crafty fight.

  The women fought, also the children fought.

  Long since with nothing to eat in them

  From burned-out roof-timbers with boiling water

  Cooking pots fell on us. Even the unharmed houses

  Were fired behind us as though nobody

  Thought to house anywhere again. For the utensils

  And rooms of home were weaponry and stuff for barricades.

  But on and always on your son drove us and drove

  Us deeper into the city which so laid to waste

  Became a grave. The rubble heaps

  Began to cut us off from one another. Smoke

  From all the taken districts, seas of fire

  Veiled out our vision. Fleeing fires

  And looking for enemies we struck upon our own.

  And no one knows whose hand your son fell by.

  The flower of Thebes, all vanished

  And Thebes herself cannot abide much longer for over her

  The people of Argos are coming now with men and

  chariots

  On all the streets. And I who have seen this

  Am glad I am already done for.

  He dies.

  ELDERS:

  Alas for us.

  CREON:

  Megareus! My son!

  ELDERS:

  Waste no

  Time on laments. Gather the stormtroops.

  CREON:

  Gather the nothings. In a sieve.

  ELDERS:

  Drunk on victory

  Thebes is jigging and all upon us

  The enemy is advancing with grey iron.

  Deceiving us

  You gave the sword away. Now

  You may wish to remember your other son.

  Fetch the younger.

  CREON:

  Yes, Haemon, the last! Yes, my latest born!

  Come and be a help now in the great collapse. Forget

  The things I said for when I was master

  I was not master of my senses.

  ELDERS:

  To the stony ground

  Hurry and quickly release the grave maker

  Rele
ase Antigone.

  CREON:

  If I dig her out

  Will you stand by me then? You, if not always

  The movers, were always compliant. That

  Implicates you.

  ELDERS:

  Go now.

  CREON:

  Axes! Axes!

  Exit Creon.

  ELDERS:

  Stop the dancing.

  ELDERS clashing the cymbals:

  Spirit of joy, pride of the waters

  That Cadmus loved

  Come if you long to see her again

  Your city, and travel fast and come

  Before nightfall for later

  She will not be there.

  For here, O god of joy

  In the mother city, in bacchantic

  Thebes you were at home, at the cold beck of Ismenus.

  By the smoke of sacrifices sweetly shaped

  Over the shoulders of the roofs you have been seen.

  Of her many houses you may meet with

  Not even the fire nor the smoke of the fire

  Nor of the smoke the shadow. Her children

  Who for a thousand years to come

  Saw themselves seated already by remotest oceans

  They will tomorrow, they have today

  Scarcely a stone to bed their heads upon.

  On the Cocytus in your day

  God of joy, you sat with the lovers

  And in Castalia’s woods. But also

  You visited the smiths and tested

  Smilingly with your thumb the sharpness of the swords.

  Often according to the undying

  Songs of Thebes

  You walked in the streets where they were still rejoicing.

  Alas, the iron hacked into its own

  But exhaustion will eat the arm nevertheless.

  Oh violence needs a miracle

  And mercy only a little wisdom.

  So now the often

  Beaten enemy stands

  Over our palaces and shows

  Full of bloody spears all around

  The seven mouths and gates

  And from there he will not depart

  Till he has filled

  His cheeks full of our blood.

  But there one of the maids comes

  Parting the throng and press of those in flight

  Surely with a message from Haemon whom the father

  Set at the head of the stormtroops who will save us.

  Enter a maid as messenger.

  MESSENGER:

  Oh so much all used up! Oh last sword broken!

  Haemon is dead, bleeding by his own hands.

  I am an eyewitness, what happened before

  I had it from the servants going with their lord

  To the high field where, its flesh being torn by dogs

  The poor dead body of Polynices lay.

  They washed him, no one speaking, and laid him

  What was left, among new leafy sprays

  And of the homeland’s earth

  Carefully they raised a little hill.

  With others hurrying ahead the lord approached

  The grave in the stony hollow where we, the maids, were

  standing.

  But one among us heard a voice and loud

  Lament and crying in the chamber

  And ran to meet the lord, to tell him.

  He hurried then, and as he neared the more

  In him he felt that dark and troubled voice

  And all around until, up close, he screamed

  And pitiably lamenting saw the bolt

  Torn from the wall and said with difficulty but as if

  He did believe himself: ‘That is not Haemon’s

  My child’s voice.’ We searched after

  The frightened master’s words. Thereupon

  Back furthest in the graves we saw

  Her, hanging by the neck, Antigone

  A noose of linen around her throat

  And him outstretched below her lifted feet

  Wailing over the bridebed and the abyss below

  And his father’s work. He, seeing this

  Went in to him and spoke to him, saying:

  ‘Come out my child, I beg you on my knees.’

  But looking coldly, saying nothing back

  The son stared back at him

  And drew his sword, two-edged against him first.

  And when the father, frightened into flight

  Turned, he failed. Then saying nothing further

  He stood and into his own side

  He thrust the swordpoint, slowly. Fell without a word.

  Death lies with death now, shyly they came to

  Their wedding’s consummation in the houses of

  The world below. The lord comes now himself.

  ELDERS:

  Our city is finished, used to reins and now

  Without any. Leaning on women

  Comes the man who is all in vain now and

  He is bearing in his hands a large memorial

  Of stupid raging …

  Enter Creon carrying Haemon’s cloak.

  CREON:

  See what I have here. It is the cloak. I thought

  It might have been a sword I went to fetch. The

  Child died on me early. One more battle

  And Argos would be in the dust. But all

  The bravery and uttermost that was mustered

  Was only against me.

  So now Thebes falls.

  And let it fall, let it with me, let it be finished

  And there for the vultures. That is my wish now.

  Exit Creon with maids.

  ELDERS:

  And turned around and in

  His hands from all the house

  Of Labdacus only a bloodstained cloth

  Into the foundering city he went away.

  But we

  Even now all follow him still and the way

  Is down. Our biddable hand

  Never to strike again

  Will be hacked off. But she who saw everything

  Could help nobody but the enemy who now

  Is coming and quickly will wipe us out. For time is short

  And disaster all around and never enough of time

  To live on thoughtlessly and easily

  From compliance to crime and

  Become wise in old age.

  The Days of the Commune

  Collaborator: RUTH BERLAU

  Translator: DAVID CONSTANTINE

  Characters:

  Mme Cabet, seamstress · Jean Cabet, her son · Babette Cherron, his girlfriend · François Faure, seminarist, National Guard · Philippe Faure, his brother, Government Forces · Geneviéve Guéricault, a young teacher · Papa, a National Guardsman · Coco, his friend · Portly gentleman · Waiter · Two children · Wounded German cuirassier · Pierre Langevin, a worker · Mme Pullard, the baker · Three women · Thiers · Jules Favre · Manservant · Bismarck · Beslay, Varlin, Rigault, Delescluze, Ranvier, delegates of the Commune · Four mayors · Delegates of the eleventh arrondissement · Tax-collector · His wife · Newspaper seller · Functionary · De Plœuc, Governor of the Bank of France · An aristocratic woman · Her niece · Servants · Street trader · Sergeant · Porter · Fat churchman · Old beggar · Officer in the National Guard · Wounded woman · Stretcher-bearers · Guy Suitry, Geneviéve’s fiancé · A nun · Ladies and gentlemen · National Guardsmen · Commune delegates · Government Forces

  1

  Around 19 January 1871. A little café in Montmartre in which a National Guard recruiting station has been set up. Outside the café a portly gentleman in a thick coat is sitting at a table in conversation with the waiter. Two children carrying a cardboard box are conferring together. Noise of artillery.

  WAITER: Monsieur Bracque was here three times asking for you.

  PORTLY GENTLEMAN: What, Bracque here, in Paris?

  WAITER: Not for very long. Here’s a message, monsieur.

&nbs
p; PORTLY GENTLEMAN reading: There’s no peace and quiet in Paris these days. Prices, percentages, commission! Well, that’s war, everyone contributes in his own way. Do you know anybody who would be willing to run certain errands for me? Somebody with nerve, but reliable. They rarely go together, eh?

  WAITER: We’ll find someone. The portly gentleman gives him a tip. And monsieur really prefers to wait out here in the cold?

  PORTLY GENTLEMAN: The air in your place has got very bad lately.

  WAITER glancing at the notice, ‘Citizens, your country is in danger, join the National Guard’: I understand.

  PORTLY GENTLEMAN: Do you? If I pay 80 francs for my breakfast I don’t want the sweat of the slums up my nose while I’m eating it. And kindly remain where you are and keep that vermin – he points at the children – away from me.

  Enter a poorly dressed woman and a young worker, carrying a basket between them. The children approach the woman.

  MME CABET: No, I don’t want anything. Yes, I do. Later perhaps. Rabbit, you say? Jean, what about a Sunday dinner?

  JEAN: That isn’t rabbit.

  MME CABET: But he wants 14 francs 50 for it.

  CHILD: The meat is fresh, madame.

  MME CABET: First of all I have to see what they’ll pay us today. Wait here, children. I might take the meat. She makes to move on and a few cockades fall out of the basket. Be a bit more careful, Jean. I’m sure we’ve lost some already along the way. Then I’ll have to talk ninety to the dozen so they won’t notice when they count.

  PORTLY GENTLEMAN: Business all around! Business, business, while the Prussians make war.

  WAITER: Small scale and large, monsieur.

  Noise and the tread of marching men in the background.

  PORTLY GENTLEMAN: What’s that? You, run and see what’s happening now. I’ll give you five francs.

  One of the children runs off

  MME CABET: We’ve brought the cockades, Emile.

  WAITER: The gentleman has a little errand for your Jean, Madame Cabet.

  MME CABET: Oh how kind of you! Jean has been out of work for two months. He’s a stoker and of course the trains aren’t running any more. What do you say, Jean?

  JEAN: I’m not one for errands, mother. You know that.

  MME CABET: I’m very sorry. Jean is the kindest person in the world. But he has opinions. He’s a bit like his late father. They carry the basket into the café.

  PORTLY GENTLEMAN: This war won’t last much longer. Aristide Jouve says so. All the business that could be done with this war has been done. There’s nothing left in it. Three National Guardsmen come limping down the street from the fighting at the forts. The first, Papa, is a building worker in his middle years; the second, Coco, a watchmaker; the third, Francois Faure, a young seminarist with his arm in a sling. They are escorting a captured German cuirassier with a dirty bandage around his chin.