The Threepenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht

Author:Bertolt Brecht
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2000-05-15T00:00:00+00:00

SONG OF THE INSUFFICIENCY OF HUMAN ENDEAVOUR

Mankind lives by its head

Its head won’t see it through

Inspect your own. What lives off that?

At most a louse or two.

For this bleak existence

Man is never sharp enough.

Hence his weak resistance

To its tricks and bluff.

Aye, make yourself a plan

They need you at the top!

Then make yourself a second plan

Then let the whole thing drop.

For this bleak existence

Man is never bad enough

Though his sheer persistence

Can be lovely stuff.

Aye, race for happiness

But don’t you race too fast.

When all start chasing happiness

Happiness comes in last.

For this bleak existence

Man is never undemanding enough.

All his loud insistence

Is a load of guff.

PEACHUM: Your plan, Brown, was brilliant but hardly realistic. All you can arrest in this place is a few young fellows celebrating their Queen’s Coronation by arranging a little fancy dress party. When the real paupers come along – there aren’t any here – there will be thousands of them. That’s the point: you’ve forgotten what an immense number of poor people there are. When you see them standing outside the Abbey, it won’t be a festive sight. You see, they don’t look good. Do you know what grogblossom is, Brown? Yes, but how about a hundred and twenty noses all flushed with grogblossom? Our young Queen’s path should be strewn with blossom, not with grogblossom. And all those cripples at the church door. That’s something one wishes to avoid, Brown. You’ll probably say the police can handle us poor folk. You don’t believe that yourself. How will it look if six hundred poor cripples have to be clubbed down at the Coronation? It will look bad. It will look disgusting. Nauseating. I feel faint at the thought of it, Brown. A small chair, if you please.

BROWN to Smith: That’s a threat. See here, you, that’s blackmail. We can’t touch the man, in the interests of public order we simply can’t touch him. I’ve never seen the like of it.

PEACHUM: You’re seeing it now. Let me tell you something. You can behave as you please to the Queen of England. But you can’t tread on the toes of the poorest man in England, or you’ll be brought down, Mr Brown.

BROWN: So you’re asking me to arrest Mac the Knife? Arrest him? That’s easy to say. You have to find a man before you can arrest him.

PEACHUM: If you say that, I can’t contradict you. So I’ll find your man for you; we’ll see if there’s any morality left. Jenny, where is Mr Macheath at this moment?

JENNY: 21 Oxford Street, at Suky Tawdry’s.

BROWN: Smith, go at once to Suky Tawdry’s place at 21 Oxford Street, arrest Macheath and take him to the Old Bailey. In the meantime, I must put on my gala uniform. On this day of all days I must wear my gala uniform.

PEACHUM: Brown, if he’s not on the gallows by six o’clock …

BROWN: Oh, Mac, it was not to be. Goes out with constables.

PEACHUM calling after him: Think about it, eh, Brown?

Third drum roll.

Third drum roll. Change of objective.

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