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Scene 2
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Mother Courage and Her Children, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
War, Failure, and Despair
Profit, Violence, and Power
Love and Nurture
Faith and Identity
Theater, Performance, and History
Summary
Analysis
The stage directions explain that three years have passed; Mother Courage, Swiss Cheese, and Kattrin will become prisoners of war and Swiss Cheese will soon die. In this scene, Mother Courage and Kattrin fold clothes on a cannon while Swiss Cheese looks on in his paymaster uniform and an attractive young sex worker named Yvette Pottier drinks and sews a hat. An Ordnance Officer begs Mother Courage to buy his bullets so he can afford liquor. But she is reluctant to trade in army property, which could get her in trouble. She talks the officer down to a guilder and a half, then sends Kattrin to make the payment.
The stage directions again give away the scene’s punchline, eroding any sense of suspense. Along with Mother Courage and Kattrin folding their laundry on the cannon, this is another example of the alienation effect, as it encourages the audience to analyze the play’s meaning rather than simply watch and enjoy it. The Ordinance Officer’s trade underlines the soldiers’ desperation and corruption, and Mother Courage’s deal with him again shows what capitalism is really about, to Brecht: profiting off human suffering.
Themes
Mother Courage gives Swiss Cheese his underwear for the cold and warns him that nothing is a must in the world, not even the weather—except that “your books must balance.” She remarks that he’s the paymaster because he’s honest, and the Ordnance Officer takes him away. Yvette complains that they didn’t say goodbye. Mother Courage tells Yvette that the war is raging on, which is good for business, but warns her against drinking in the morning because of her illness. Yvette says that she’s not sick—it’s just a nasty rumor. She says that everyone is avoiding her because her love, a Dutch army cook the girls nicknamed “Peter Piper,” has cheated on her.
Brecht again suggests that Mother Courage’s self-interested warmongering is really the foundational principle of modern capitalist societies. Indeed, her adage that “your books must balance” captures the way capitalist maxims have become common wisdom: it’s simply taken for granted that the economy is the foundation of everything, nothing is for certain except death and taxes, and so on. Meanwhile, like many characters and events in this play, Yvette Pottier seems to come out of nowhere, but she plays an important symbolic role. Above all, she serves as a foil for Mother Courage and Kattrin, and her story will underline women’s fraught place in war (and societies that depend on it). Moreover, whether or not audiences realize that “Peter Piper” is the Cook from the last scene, this fact will become significant later on in the play.
Themes
Yvette sings “The Camp Follower’s Song.” When the enemy army came to her land, she sings, she was just 17. Each of the soldiers took a girl—a Dutch cook took her, and she fell in love. But one winter, the men all disappeared. She foolishly went looking for the cook. Ten years have passed, and she hasn’t found him. After finishing the song, she hides behind the wagon. Next, Mother Courage tells Kattrin not to fall for a military man because they charm people and then enslave them forever.
Yvette’s story shows that, just like the military tricks young men into giving away their lives by promising them fame and glory, it manipulates young women into doing the same through the promise of love. (Presumably, once she had been with the Cook and was no longer a virgin, she had no choice but to stay with the military as a sex worker because no other man would marry her.) Audiences will probably figure that Mother Courage’s warning to Kattrin is based on her own past—and this again raises questions about the potentially traumatic circumstances that led to her having children.
Themes
The Chaplain and Cook enter, looking for brandy. The Chaplain explains that Eilif has a message for Swiss Cheese, but Mother Courage says Swiss Cheese has left. She complains that Eilif wants to corrupt Swiss Cheese and gives the men money for Eilif. The Cook says that Swiss Cheese may not come back, but the Chaplain protests that “dying for one’s beliefs” in a religious war is a great honor. (The Cook jokes that God’s approval makes the “cheating, plunder, rape, and so forth” legitimate.)
Yvette is out of sight during this portion of the scene, which is why she and the Cook do not recognize one another. The Chaplain’s interest in brandy and absurd comments about the war again show how people use religion to justify atrocities and control one another—including promising them salvation to get them to give up their lives in futile wars. Where the Chaplain sees the hand of God, it’s clear that Brecht sees only power and manipulation.
Themes
Literary Devices
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The Chaplain suggests that the Cook dreams about Mother Courage, but the Cook denies it—he just dreams about a young woman serving brandy. Mother Courage says she’ll give them their drink, lest they start “making improper advances out of sheer boredom.” The Chaplain comments in the third-person that the Chaplain is going to do exactly that, and then he asks Mother Courage about her “captivating” daughter Kattrin. Mother Courage calls Kattrin “respectable,” not “captivating,” then takes the Cook and Chaplain behind the wagon to dispense their brandy.
The Cook’s dream and the Chaplain’s comments mix two vices, sex and alcohol, which seem to be soldiers’ only solace amidst the brutality of war. Meanwhile, the Chaplain’s strange meta-commentary again shows the alienation effect at work. First, he briefly breaks character, as though to remind the audience that he is just a character in a play and force them to question the meaning of his actions. Then, he does the opposite of what a Chaplain is supposed to do by shamelessly sexualizing Kattrin. In doing so, he again underlines the way that the war uses religion as an excuse for brutality and control.
Themes
Changing the subject, Mother Courage blames the Poles for the Swedish invasion of Poland. The Chaplain and Cook agree that the Swedes have a religious obligation to free the Poles from the German Kaiser, and the Cook sings Luther’s Hymn, which describes God as a “mighty fortress” protecting the faithful from sin. The Cook remarks that the Swedish King Gustavus “made quite a profit” by conquering Germany, but the Chaplain is offended: he thinks the King’s real motive is religion. Mother Courage agrees with the Cook—she comments that “little fellows like you and me” fight on the King’s side because they know he’s in it for profit, and they are too. They all toast the Protestant flag.
Mother Courage’s explanation of the war is self-serving: she blames the victims for being invaded. Presumably, she does this because it helps her justify her job feeding (and profiting from) the invaders. The Cook and Chaplain’s claims about their religious obligations serve exactly the same purpose. They’re also Brecht’s warning about the Nazis, who used religion to justify their violence and conquest in much the same way. Nevertheless, Mother Courage’s final comment about the King’s real motives—self-interest and profit—shows that, even if she blames the victims for the invasion, she is still the only character who understands the invasion’s real purpose. For all her faults, then, in a way, she’s actually the most honest character in the play.
Themes
Suddenly, the Catholic army starts firing on the Swedes. The Cook and Ordnance Officer run off to battle, the Chaplain decides to stay, and a soldier tries and fails to wheel away the cannon. When Kattrin arrives wearing Yvette’s hat and boots, Mother Courage compares her to a sex worker and hides the boots behind her wagon. Yvette briefly shows up to powder her face and look for her boots, then runs off. Swiss Cheese comes with his cashbox, which Mother Courage tells him to hide. She also removes the Chaplain’s coat, rubs dirt all over Kattrin’s face so the soldiers don’t think to kidnap her, and takes down her Protestant flag.
When she puts on Yvette’s hat and boots, Kattrin appears to be fantasizing about being an unbothered, casual young woman—someone who could worry more about looking good and finding a husband than surviving the war and who could derive status and influence from her beauty. When audiences recall that she has lived her whole life in the war and has lost her speech due to her traumatic experiences, it becomes clear why she would dream of an ordinary life. It’s telling that Mother Courage rubs dirt on her to make her unattractive: this shows that, like Eilif’s bravery, Swiss Cheese’s honesty, and Mother Courage’s courage, Kattrin’s beauty is actually a liability for her in the war, since soldiers may kidnap and rape her.
Themes
Literary Devices
Mother Courage, Swiss Cheese, Kattrin, and the Chaplain spend three days anxiously waiting out the battle. The scene picks up on the third morning, as Swiss Cheese worries that his fellow soldiers are looking for him. The group rations out milk, and the Chaplain prays and warns that there are Catholics everywhere—there was even a one-eyed Catholic spy in the hole he was using as a toilet. Mother Courage admonishes Kattrin for “strutting like a peacock” in Yvette’s stolen boots, then takes the Chaplain away to go buy meat and a Catholic flag.
Brecht intentionally defies the conventions of the theater by announcing to his audience that three days have passed in the middle of this scene (instead of just ending it and starting a new scene three days later). Of course, this only underlines the unusual timeline in the play as a whole: most of the scenes are set years apart, such that the plot is more a series of vignettes than a continuous narrative. The Chaplain’s odd, improbable comment about a Catholic spy hiding in a hole of the ground contrasts with the play’s otherwise serious tone, so it again enacts the “distancing effect,” pulling audience members out of the narrative and forcing them to analyze it.
Themes
Swiss Cheese hatches a plan to bury his cashbox near the river so that he can eventually bring it back to his sergeant. Kattrin goes behind the wagon, where two soldiers (the Sergeant and One Eye) confront her, asking for Swiss Cheese. She runs back in terror and desperately tries to warn her brother with noises and gestures, but he confidently walks off to bury his cashbox. When Mother Courage and the Chaplain return, Kattrin tries to explain what happened through howls and gestures. The Chaplain raises the Catholic flag, then figures out that Kattrin is talking about the one-eyed spy.
Unlike most of the soldiers in the play—including Eilif—Swiss Cheese is loyal and honest. He wants to save the cashbox so that he can eventually fulfill his duties as paymaster. But this seems to be putting him in peril. In contrast, the Chaplain has no such sense of honesty or morality. Indeed, it's profoundly ironic that the Chaplain raises the Catholic flag, as his entire job was to create a (Protestant) religious justification for the war. When the situation gets serious, even he is willing to abandon his beliefs and put survival first. In turn, this means that he does not truly believe what he preached: that soldiers should care more about saving their souls than saving their lives.
Themes
The Sergeant and One Eye roughly escort Swiss Cheese back to the stage. Swiss Cheese claims that Mother Courage is just the woman who sold him lunch, and she offers the soldiers brandy, but they refuse. The soldiers insist that Swiss Cheese was hiding something under his shirt. They demand to know where the cashbox is, threaten to kill Swiss Cheese, and lead him off. Mother Courage begs Swiss Cheese to tell the truth and save himself.
In the war, just like Eilif’s bravery turns him into a monster, Swiss Cheese’s honesty ends up putting him in peril. Again, Brecht’s message is clear: war is cruel and inhuman, so it rewards the immoral and punishes the virtuous. In fact, Swiss Cheese’s interaction with the Catholic soldiers in this scene rehashes this dynamic on a smaller scale. Namely, staying loyal and honest to his commander requires lying to the soldiers.
Themes
That evening, Mother Courage explains that she has a plan to pawn her wagon and buy Swiss Cheese’s freedom. Yvette enters with an elderly Colonel, tells him that she would love to buy Mother Courage’s wagon, and says that a blond Lieutenant promised to lend her money. The Colonel jealously tells her not to trust the Lieutenant and agrees to pay 200 guilders for the wagon. Mother Courage has two weeks to pay the money back if she wants to recover the wagon. Yvette gets on the wagon and promises to follow the Colonel to camp, and the Colonel leaves.
While Mother Courage’s plot to rescue Swiss Cheese demonstrates that she cares deeply about her children, it’s telling that she tries to save him by means of her overriding obsession in life: commerce. Perhaps she cannot conceive of anything else to do, as she has dedicated her life to trading, or perhaps she thinks that the soldiers are more likely to give Swiss Cheese back if there’s profit in it for them. Yvette’s chat with the Colonel shows how war turns love into a transaction, too. This is true in both directions: he buys her time and affection, while she uses him to get the loan for Mother Courage.
Themes
Mother Courage begs Yvette to follow through with the promise she has already made: to give One Eye the 200 guilders as a bribe to save Swiss Cheese, who is facing a court marshal in an hour. Yvette leaves and Mother Courage explains the rest of her plan: once Swiss Cheese is free, she will buy back the wagon with the money from his cashbox. Yvette returns and reports that One Eye agreed to the deal, but Swiss Cheese threw the cashbox in the river when he was captured. Mother Courage desperately asks Yvette to bargain One Eye down to 120 guilders, so she will have something left over to live on.
Mother Courage’s knack for negotiation initially appears to be an asset, but all does not go according to plan. Swiss Cheese’s last-ditch act of loyalty to the Swedish army—throwing the cashbox into the river so that it won’t fall into enemy hands—ironically undermines his mother’s plan and may even prevent him from regaining his freedom. Forced to choose between her beloved son and the wagon that is her livelihood, Mother Courage decides to try to save both.
Themes
Yvette leaves again, and Mother Courage and Kattrin clean knives for a few minutes. Then, Yvette returns to explain that One Eye will only take 200 guilders, and Mother Courage agrees. Yvette runs off, and Mother Courage wonders if she “haggled too long.” The stage goes dark, then lights up, and Yvette returns to tell Mother Courage that it’s too late: they already executed Swiss Cheese. Worse still, the soldiers think Mother Courage is hiding the cashbox, and they’re bringing her Swiss Cheese’s body to see if she admits to knowing him.
Swiss Cheese’s death is tragic because it was so avoidable. But this is precisely Brecht’s point—the most devastating part of war is that the death and destruction it causes is utterly arbitrary and meaningless. Needless to say, Mother Courage’s attempt to bargain down the price of Swiss Cheese’s freedom is in part responsible for his death. Again, Brecht’s message is clear and blunt: when we put profit before human beings, we end up destroying them. The soldiers’ quest for the cashbox only underlines how the toxic combination of war and money turns ordinary people into heartless, self-interested brutes.
Themes
Mother Courage holds Kattrin’s hand, and surely enough, the soldiers show up with Swiss Cheese’s body on a stretcher. They pull back the sheet to show Mother Courage his face and demand to know if she knew him before the time when she served him lunch. Mother Courage shakes her head no. The soldiers decide that Swiss Cheese’s body will go in the dump because “he has no one that knows him.”
By making audiences watch Mother Courage come face-to-face with her son’s body, Brecht forces them to confront the profound tragedy of war and the depth of human corruption. Worse still, Mother Courage must pretend not to know Swiss Cheese, hiding her sorrow and going on in her life with the knowledge that he never got the burial he deserved. Once again, audiences must strike a balance between profound sympathy for Mother Courage and outrage at how she ends up destroying her own family through her warmongering and obsession with profit.
Themes
