Brecht Collected Plays: 5: Life of Galileo; Mother Courage and Her Children (World Classics) (55 page)

GALILEO
This house is like a marketplace (
Pointing to the model
) Move that out of the way! Put it down there!
(
Ludovico does
)

LUDOVICO
Good morning, sir. My name is Ludovico Marsili.

GALILEO
(
reading a letter of recommendation he has brought
) You came by way of Holland and your family lives in the Campagna? Private lessons, thirty scudi a month.

LUDOVICO
That’s all right, of course, sir.

GALILEO
What is your subject?

LUDOVICO
Horses.

GALILEO
Aha.

LUDOVICO
I don’t understand science, sir.

GALILEO
Aha.

LUDOVICO
They showed me an instrument like that in Amsterdam. You’ll pardon me, sir, but it didn’t make sense to me at all.

GALILEO
It’s out of date now. (
Andrea goes
)

LUDOVICO
You’ll have to be patient with me, sir. Nothing in science makes sense to me.

GALILEO
Aha.

LUDOVICO
I saw a brand new instrument in Amsterdam. A tube affair. “See things five times as large as life!” It had two lenses, one at each end, one lens bulged and the other was like that. (
Gesture
) Any normal person would think that different lenses cancel each other out. They didn’t! I just stood and looked a fool.

GALILEO
I don’t quite follow you. What does one see enlarged?

LUDOVICO
Church steeples, pigeons, boats. Anything at a distance.

GALILEO
Did you yourself – see things enlarged?

LUDOVICO
Yes, sir.

GALILEO
And the tube had two lenses? Was it like this? (
He has been
making a sketch
) (
Ludovico nods
)

GALILEO
A recent invention?

LUDOVICO
It must be. They only started peddling it on the streets a few days before I left Holland.

GALILEO
(
starts to scribble calculations on the sketch; almost
friendly
) Why do you bother your head with science? Why don’t you just breed horses?

(
Enter Mrs. Sarti. Galileo doesn’t see her. She listens to the following
)

LUDOVICO
My mother is set on the idea that science is necessary nowadays for conversation.

GALILEO
Aha. You’ll find Latin or philosophy easier. (
Mrs. Sarti
catches his eye
) I’ll see you on Tuesday afternoon.

LUDOVICO
I shall look forward to it, sir.

GALILEO
Good morning. (
He goes to the window and shouts into
the street
) Andrea! Hey, Redhead, Redhead!

MRS. SARTI
The curator of the museum is here to see you.

GALILEO
Don’t look at me like that. I took him, didn’t I?

MRS. SARTI
I caught your eye in time.

GALILEO
Show the curator in.

(
She goes. He scribbles something on a new sheet of paper. The
Curator comes in
)

CURATOR
Good morning, Mr. Galilei.

GALILEO
Lend me a scudo. (
He takes it and goes to the window, wrapping the coin in the paper on which he has been scribbling
) Redhead, run to the spectacle-maker and bring me two lenses; here are the measurements. (
He throws the paper out of the window. During the following scene Galileo studies his sketch of the lenses
)

CURATOR
Mr. Galilei, I have come to return your petition for an honorarium. Unfortunately I am unable to recommend your request.

GALILEO
My good sir, how can I make ends meet on five hundred scudi?

CURATOR
What about your private students?

GALILEO
If I spend all my time with students, when am I to study? My particular science is on the threshold of important discoveries. (
He throws a manuscript on the table
) Here are my findings on the laws of falling bodies. That should be worth 200 scudi.

CURATOR
I am sure that any paper of yours is of infinite worth, Mr. Galilei….

GALILEO
I was limiting it to 200 scudi.

CURATOR
(
cool
) Mr. Galilei, if you want money and leisure, go to Florence. I have no doubt Prince Cosmo de Medici will be glad to subsidize you, but eventually you will be forbidden to think – in the name of the Inquisition. (
Galileo says nothing
) Now let us not make a mountain out of a molehill. You are happy here in the Republic of Venice but you need money. Well, that’s human, Mr. Galilei, may I suggest a simple solution? You remember that chart you made for the army to extract cube roots without any knowledge of mathematics? Now that was practical!

GALILEO
Bosh!

CURATOR
Don’t say bosh about something that astounded the Chamber of Commerce. Our city elders are businessmen. Why don’t you invent something useful that will bring them a little profit?

GALILEO
(
playing with the sketch of the lenses; suddenly
) I see. Mr. Priuli, I may have something for you.

CURATOR
You don’t say so.

GALILEO
It’s not quite there yet, but …

CURATOR
You’ve never let me down yet, Galilei.

GALILEO
You are always an inspiration to me, Priuli.

CURATOR
You are a great man: a discontented man, but I’ve always said you are a great man.

GALILEO
(
tartly
) My discontent, Priuli, is for the most part with myself. I am forty-six years of age and have achieved nothing which satisfies me.

CURATOR
I won’t disturb you any further.

GALILEO
Thank you. Good morning.

CURATOR
Good morning. And thank you.

(
He goes. Galileo sighs. Andrea returns, bringing lenses
)

ANDREA
One scudo was not enough. I had to leave my cap with him before he’d let me take them away.

GALILEO
We’ll get it back some day. Give them to me. (
He takes the lenses over to the window, holding them in the relation they would have in a telescope
)

ANDREA
What are those for?

GALILEO
Something for the senate. With any luck, they will rake in 200 scudi. Take a look!

ANDREA
My, things look close! I can read the copper letters on the bell in the Campanile. And the washerwomen by the river, I can see their washboards!

GALILEO
Get out of the way. (
Looking through the lenses himself
) Aha!

Scene Two

No one’s virtue is complete:

Great Galileo liked to eat
.

You will not resent, we hope
,

The truth about his telescope
.

The great arsenal of Venice, overlooking the harbor full of ships. Senators and Officials on one side, Galileo, his daughter Virginia and
his friend Sagredo, on the other side. They are dressed in formal, festive clothes. Virginia is fourteen and charming. She carries a velvet cushion on which lies a brand new telescope. Behind Galileo are some Artisans from the arsenal. There are onlookers, Ludovico amongst them
.

CURATOR
(
announcing
) Senators, Artisans of the Great Arsenal of Venice; Mr. Galileo Galilei, professor of mathematics at your University of Padua.

(
Galileo steps forward and starts to speak
)

GALILEO
Members of the High Senate! Gentlemen: I have great pleasure, as director of this institute, in presenting for your approval and acceptance an entirely new instrument originating from this our great arsenal of the Republic of Venice. As professor of mathematics at your University of Padua, your obedient servant has always counted it his privilege to offer you such discoveries and inventions as might prove lucrative to the manufacturers and merchants of our Venetian Republic. Thus, in all humility, I tender you this, my optical tube, or telescope, constructed, I assure you, on the most scientific and Christian principles, the product of seventeen years patient research at your University of Padua. (
Galileo steps back. The senators applaud
)

SAGREDO
(
aside to Galileo
) Now you will be able to pay your bills.

GALILEO
Yes. It will make money for them. But you realize that it is more than a money-making gadget? – I turned it on the moon last night …

CURATOR
(
in his best chamber-of-commerce manner
) Gentlemen: Our Republic is to be congratulated not only because this new acquisition will be one more feather in the cap of Venetian culture … (
Polite applause
) … not only because our own Mr. Galilei has generously handed this fresh product of his teeming brain entirely over to you, allowing you to manufacture as many of these highly saleable articles as you please…. (
Considerable applause
) But Gentlemen of the Senate, has it occurred to you that – with the help of this remarkable new instrument – the battlefleet of the enemy will be visible to us a full two hours before we are visible to him? (
Tremendous applause
)

GALILEO
(
aside to Sagredo
) We have been held up three generations for lack of a thing like this. I want to go home.

SAGREDO
What about the moon?

GALILEO
Well, for one thing, it doesn’t give off its own light.

CURATOR
(
continuing his oration
) And now, Your Excellency, and Members of the Senate, Mr. Galilei entreats you to accept the instrument from the hands of his charming daughter Virginia. (
Polite applause. He beckons to Virginia who steps forward and presents the telescope to the Doge
)

CURATOR
(
during this
) Mr. Galilei gives his invention entirely into your hands, Gentlemen, enjoining you to construct as many of these instruments as you may please.

(
More applause. The Senators gather round the telescope, examining it, and looking through it
)

GALILEO
(
aside to Sagredo
) Do you know what the Milky Way is made of?

SAGREDO
No.

GALILEO
I do.

CURATOR
(
interrupting
) Congratulations, Mr. Galilei. Your extra five hundred scudi a year are safe.

GALILEO
Pardon? What? Of course, the five hundred scudi! Yes! (
A
prosperous man is standing beside the Curator
)

CURATOR
Mr. Galilei, Mr. Matti of Florence.

MATTI
You’re opening new fields, Mr. Galilei. We could do with you at Florence.

CURATOR
Now, Mr. Matti, leave something to us poor Venetians.

MATTI
It is a pity that a great republic has to seek an excuse to pay its great men their right and proper dues.

CURATOR
Even a great man has to have an incentive. (
He joins the
Senators at the telescope
)

MATTI
I am an iron founder.

GALILEO
Iron founder!

MATTI
With factories at Pisa and Florence. I wanted to talk to you about a machine you designed for a friend of mine in Padua.

GALILEO
I’ll put you on to someone to copy it for you, I am not going to have the time. – How are things in Florence? (
They wander away
)

FIRST SENATOR
(
peering
) Extraordinary! They’re having their lunch on that frigate. Lobsters! I’m hungry! (
Laughter
)

SECOND SENATOR
Oh, good heavens, look at her! I must tell my wife to stop bathing on the roof. When can I buy one of these things?

(
Laughter. Virginia has spotted Ludovico among the onlookers and drags him to Galileo
)

VIRGINIA
(
to Ludovico
) Did I do it nicely?

LUDOVICO
I thought so.

VIRGINIA
Here’s Ludovico to congratulate you, father.

LUDOVICO
(
embarrassed
) Congratulations, sir.

GALILEO
I improved it.

LUDOVICO
Yes, sir. I am beginning to understand science.

(
Galileo is surrounded
)

VIRGINIA
Isn’t father a great man?

LUDOVICO
Yes.

VIRGINIA
Isn’t the new thing father made pretty?

LUDOVICO
Yes, a pretty red. Where I saw it first it was covered in green.

VIRGINIA
What was?

LUDOVICO
Never mind. (
A short pause
) Have you ever been to Holland?

(
They go. All Venice is congratulating Galileo, who wants to go home
)

Scene Three

January ten, sixteen ten:

Galileo Galilei abolishes heaven
.

Galileo’s study at Padua. It is night. Galileo and Sagredo at a telescope
.

SAGREDO
(
softly
) The edge of the crescent is jagged. All along the dark part, near the shiny crescent, bright particles of light keep coming up, one after the other and growing larger and merging with the bright crescent.