Untitled

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32941, 13 June 1972, Page 10

The hopes of the small trader Courage Deal death to her children. But her daughters dumb despair at war Belongs to the new. Her helplessness As she drags up her warning drum To beat atride the roof Should will you with pride. The capability of her mother Who learns nothing Should fill you with pity. Mildred Woods as Mother Courage and Rosemary Lyons as Kattrin, her daughter, in a scene from the University Drama Society’s production of Bertold Brecht’s play, “Mother Courage.” The scene is in .the climax of the play, when Kattrin attempts to save a town and prevent a massacre. The excerpt above is from a poem which contains Brecht's advice to his actors. Brecht's plays are about ordinary men and women struggling against exploitation and oppression, and the actors therefore become workers for a revolutionary cause. But this does not preclude humour, for Brecht’s theatre is full of gaiety. But in “Mother Courage” Kattrin is dumb, and that is why she must beat the drum. Virtue in Brecht’s plays, says the co-producer, Mervyn Thompson, has a habit of being unable to express itself in words. The play will open in the Ngaio Marsh Theatre on June 17.