Mother Courage And Her Children Analysis

"War makes human virtues fatal, even to their possessor." Bertolt Brecht questions the purpose of virtues during war in his play, Mother Courage and Her Children. While the play is set during the Thirty Years' War, Brecht suggests that during the German invasion of Poland, there is a lack of morality in society which is caused by the war. To convey the immoral effects of war, Brecht uses the journey of mother courage's cart in order to map the imminent loss of society's virtuousness during a war as society struggles to survive. Brecht uses the deterioration of the cart in order to suggest there is no place for virtues during war. Moreover, the adversity caused by the cart conveys the corruption of virtues caused by war. However, through dependency …show more content…
To develop that there is no place for virtues during war, Brecht constructs the destructive effects of virtues through the damages upon the cart when a child of Mother Courage actively uses virtues during events in the play. Each child is a personification of a virtue in the play. An example is when Mother Courage describes Eilif as “… brave and rash” to personify to virtue of bravery. This is said in reference to Eilif picking a piece of paper which foreshadows his death. Mother courage uses the description to a possible reason for his death. The desolate tone of these lines show how Mother Courage portrays bravery as a negative virtue, thus furthering her proof that it leads to Eilif’s death. The diction of “rash” shows the harsh language choices of Brecht in order to show that bravery is negative. In order to portray the effects of virtues towards the survival, the cart is damaged when a virtue is being used. This is seen when Swiss cheese is tortured and executed for hiding the regimental cashbox. The following scene explains that the Cart is damaged during the execution of Swiss cheese, when Mother Courage says, “They took their sabres and smashed