Bertolt Brecht Quotes

The headlong stream is termed violent
But the river bed hemming it in
Is termed violent by no one. ~ Bertolt Brecht

A Man lives off his head.
His head won't see him through.
Inspect your own
What lives on that?
At most, a louse or two ... ~ Bertolt Brecht

What rapture, oh, it is to know A good thing when you see it And having seen a good thing, oh, What rapture 'tis to flee it. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Right is its own defense. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Intelligence is not to make no mistakes, but quickly to see how to make them good. ~ Bertolt Brecht

From the cradle to the coffin underwear comes first. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Then I'll go on, get it off my chest. It all starts with yours truly growing up in lovely Flanders, else I'd never of seen him and wouldn't be stuck here now in Poland, cause he was an army cook, fair-haired, a Dutchman but thin for once. Kattrin, watch out for the thin ones, only in those days I didn't know that, or that he'd got a girl already, or that they all called him Puffing Piet cause he never took out his pipe out of his mouth when he was on the job, it meant that little to him. ~ Bertolt Brecht

The aim of science is not to open the door to infinite wisdom, but to set a limit to infinite error. ~ Bertolt Brecht

He says he'd like to kiss the ground you walk on-reminds me, did you wash them yesterday?- and after that you're his skivvy. ~ Bertolt Brecht

He who laughs last has not yet heard the bad news. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Everyone chases after happiness,
not noticing that happiness is right at their heels ~ Bertolt Brecht

As regards obstacles, the shortest distance between two points can be a curve. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Spring is noticed, if at all By people sitting in railway trains. ~ Bertolt Brecht

The first time it was reported that our friends were being butchered there was a cry of horror. Then a hundred were butchered. But when a thousand were butchered and there was no end to the butchery, a blanket of silence spread.
When evil-doing comes like falling rain, nobody calls out "stop!"
When crimes begin to pile up they become invisible. When sufferings become unendurable the cries are no longer heard. The cries, too, fall like rain in summer. ~ Bertolt Brecht

A good soldier has his heart and soul in it. When he receives an order, he gets a hard on, and when he drives his lance through his enemy's guts, he comes. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Life is short and so is money. ~ Bertolt Brecht

One cannot write poems about trees when the forest is full of police. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Before familiarity can turn into awareness the familiar must be stripped of its inconspicuousness; we must give up assuming that the object in question needs no explanation. However frequently recurrent, modest, vulgar it may be it will now be be labeled as something unusual. ~ Bertolt Brecht

There are men who struggle for a day and they are good. There are men who struggle for a year and they are better. There are men who struggle many years, and they are better still. But there are those who struggle all their lives: These are the indispensable ones. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Sitting and sedition don't mix. ~ Bertolt Brecht

People remain what they are even if their faces fall apart. ~ Bertolt Brecht

He remembered Bertolt Brecht: I would also like to be wise. In the old books it says what wisdom is: To shun the strife of the world and to live out Your brief time without fear All this I cannot do. ~ Madeleine Thien

Sometimes I have visions of myself driving through hell, selling sulphur and brimstone, or through heaven peddling refreshments to the roaming souls. If me and the children I've got left could find a place where there's no shooting, I wouldn't mind a few years of peace and quiet. ~ Bertolt Brecht

With drooping shoulders The majority sit hunched, their foreheads furrowed like Stony ground that has been repeatedly ploughed-up to no purpose. ~ Bertolt Brecht

I don't like where I'm going and I don't like where I've been. Why am I in a hurry? ~ Bertolt Brecht

The more there are suffering, then, the more natural their sufferings appear. Who wants to prevent the fishes in the sea from getting wet?
And the suffering themselves share this callousness towards themselves and are lacking in kindness towards themselves. It is terrible that human beings so easily put up with existing conditions, not only with the sufferings of strangers but also with their own.
All those who have thought about the bad state of things refuse to appeal to the compassion of one group of people for another. But the compassion of the oppressed for the oppressed is indispensable. It is the world's one hope. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Weaknesses

You had none
I had one:
I loved. ~ Bertolt Brecht

As soon as something seems the most obvious thing in the world,it means that we have abandoned all attempts to understanding it. ~ Bertolt Brecht

O blindness of the great!
They go their way like gods,
Great over bent backs,
Sure of hired fists,
Trusting in the power
Which has lasted so long.
But long is not forever.
O change from age to age!
Thou hope of the people! ~ Bertolt Brecht

Alas,we who wanted kindness, could not be kind ourselves. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Suppose they gave a war, and nobody came? Why then, the war would come to you! ~ Bertolt Brecht

One can describe the world of today to the people of today only if one describes it as capable of alteration. ~ Bertolt Brecht

The man who laughs has simply not yet had the terrible news. ~ Bertolt Brecht

The worst illiterate is the political illiterate, he doesn't hear, doesn't speak, nor participates in the political events. He doesn't know the cost of life, the price of the bean, of the fish, of the flour, of the rent, of the shoes and of the medicine, all depends on political decisions. The political illiterate is so stupid that he is proud and swells his chest saying that he hates politics. The imbecile doesn't know that, from his political ignorance is born the prostitute, the abandoned child, and the worst thieves of all, the bad politician, corrupted and flunky of the national and multinational companies. ~ Bertolt Brecht

What happens to the hole when the cheese is gone? ~ Bertolt Brecht

Those who are against Fascism without being against capitalism, who lament over the barbarism that comes out of barbarism, are like people who wish to eat their veal without slaughtering the calf. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Writers can't write as fast as governments make wars; because to write demands thinking. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Oh! Moon of Alabama We now must say good-bye We've lost our good old mama And must have whiskey Oh, you know why! ~ Bertolt Brecht

He was weak on philosophy and an excellent driver, but his driving was a lot more dangerous than his philosophy. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Grub first, then ethics. ~ Bertolt Brecht

I won't let you spoil my war for me. Destroys the weak, does it? Well, what does peace do for'em, huh? War feeds its people better. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Let nothing be called natural In an age of bloody confusion, Ordered disorder, planned caprice, And dehumanized humanity, lest all things Be held unalterable! ~ Bertolt Brecht

First the pork chops, then morality ~ Bertolt Brecht

Who built Thebes of the seven gates?
In the books you will find the name of kings.
Did the kings haul up the lumps of rock?
And Babylon, many times demolished.
Who raised it up so many times? In what houses
Of gold-glittering Lima did the builders live?
Where, the evening that the Wall of China was finished
Did the masons go? Great Rome
Is full of triumphal arches. Who erected them? Over whom
Did the Caesars triumph? Had Byzantium, much praised in song,
Only palaces for its inhabitants? Even in fabled Atlantis
The night the ocean engulfed it
The drowning still bawled for their slaves. ~ Bertolt Brecht

First the grub, then the morals. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Poverty makes you wise but it's a curse. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Old Man, right (sighing): Death to the fascists! ~ Bertolt Brecht

Telling me there's no difference between the moon and the Earth? ~ Bertolt Brecht

Reality changes; in order to represent it, modes of representation must change. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Today every invention is received with a cry of triumph which soon turns into a cry of fear. ~ Bertolt Brecht

We attacked a foreign people and treated them like rebels. As you know, it's all right to treat barbarians barbarically. It's the desire to be barbaric that makes governments call their enemies barbarians. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Why be a man when you can be a success. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Their peace and their war Are like wind and storm. War grows from their peace. ~ Bertolt Brecht

In my poetry a rhyme
Would seem to me almost insolent.
Inside me contend
Delight at the apple tree in blossom
And horror at the house-painter's speeches.
But only the second
Drives me to my desk. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Sometimes it's more important to be human, than to have good taste. ~ Bertolt Brecht

People are too durable, that's their main trouble. They can do too much to themselves, they last too long. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Who built the seven towers of Thebes?
The books are filled with the names of kings.
Was it kings who hauled the craggy blocks of stone? ...
In the evening when the Chinese wall was finished
Where did the masons go? ... ~ Bertolt Brecht

Boy meets girl. So what? ~ Bertolt Brecht

What is the robbing of a bank compared to the founding of a bank? ~ Bertolt Brecht

Fearful is the seductive power of goodness. ~ Bertolt Brecht

He who laughs has not yet heard the bad news. ~ Bertolt Brecht

War is like love; it always finds a way. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Who fights may lose, but who does not fight has lost already. ~ Bertolt Brecht

On a certain day in the blue-moon month of September
Beneath a young plum tree, quietly
I held her there, my quiet, pale beloved
In my arms just like a graceful dream.
And over us in the beautiful summer sky
There was a cloud on which my gaze rested
It was very white and so immensely high
And when I looked up, it had disappeared. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Unhappy is the land that breeds no hero!
No, Andrea ... unhappy is the land that needs a hero. ~ Bertolt Brecht

When something seems 'the most obvious thing in the world' it means that any attempt to understand the world has been given up. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Terrible is the temptation to be good. ~ Bertolt Brecht

No one will improve your lot if you do not yourself. ~ Bertolt Brecht

When the house of a great one collapses Many little ones are slain. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Knowledge is just a commodity. It is acquired in order to be resold. All those who have grown out of going to school have to do their learning virtually in secret, for anyone who admits the he has still something to learn devalues himself as a man whose knowledge is inadequate. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Poverty makes you sad as well as wise. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Think with feeling ~ Bertolt Brecht

Temptation to behave is terrible. ~ Bertolt Brecht

We often do not know ourselves the grounds On which we act, though plain to others. ~ Bertolt Brecht

I'm in good form, taking no interest in things, neglecting clothes, meals, company, and feeling calm and stable as I write. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Every time you name yourself, you name someone else. ~ Bertolt Brecht

I want to go with the one I love.
I do not want to calculate the cost.
I do not want to think about whether it's good.
I do not want to know whether he loves me.
I want to go with whom I love ... ~ Bertolt Brecht

I refuse to give readers an uplifting faux experience engineered to comfort them and perpetuate the sociopolitical and economic status quo."
"Who died and made you Bertolt Brecht? ~ Chuck Palahniuk

People who understand everything get no stories. ~ Bertolt Brecht

The fanatics for progress often have too little appreciation of the existing. ~ Bertolt Brecht

There are times when you have to choose between being human and having good taste. ~ Bertolt Brecht

The more innocent they are, the more they deserve to be shot. ~ Bertolt Brecht

If you wan to steal money, don't rob a bank - open one. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Mixing one's wines may be a mistake, but old and new wisdom mix admirably. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Unhappily, my wife is expecting me in connection with a fish ~ Bertolt Brecht

Righteous people have no sense of humor. ~ Bertolt Brecht

The shrill voices of those who give orders
Are full of fear like the squeakings of
Piglets awaiting the butcher's knife, as their fat arses
Sweat with anxiety in their office chairs ...
Fear rules not only those who are ruled, but
The rulers too. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Who struggles can fail. Who doesn't struggle has already failed! ~ Bertolt Brecht

Who does Not Know the Truth, is simply a Fool ... Yet who Knows the Truth and Calls it a Lie, is a Criminal. ~ Bertolt Brecht

All artforms are in the service of the greatest of all arts: the art of living. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Impact lies in the vicinity of mistakes. ~ Bertolt Brecht

All the world says: yes we know what's written in the books but now let's see what our eyes tell us. ~ Bertolt Brecht

Girl Tractorist: As the poet Mayakovsky said: "The home of the Soviet people shall be the home of Reason"! ~ Bertolt Brecht

Who destroys books? Cities, churches, dictators and fanatics. Their fingers itch to build a pyre and strike the match. On 10 May 1933, students gathered in Berlin to dance around a bonfire of 25,000 volumes of 'un-German' books. They burned, amongst many others, Bertolt Brecht, Otto Dix, Heinrich Heine, Ernest Hemingway, James Joyce and H.G. Wells. They destroyed them because the contents were too dangerous. ~ Linda Grant

Carpenter: "Call Shen Te, someone! She's good!"
Shui Ta: "Certainly. She's ruined. ~ Bertolt Brecht

First feed the face, then talk right and wrong. ~ Bertolt Brecht

A man who strains himself on the stage is bound, if he is any good, to strain all the people sitting in the stalls. ~ Bertolt Brecht

You who will emerge from the flood
In which we have gone under
Remember
When you speak of our failings
The dark time too
Which you have escaped ~ Bertolt Brecht

THE POLICEMAN: I'm a policeman. I'm paid by those in charge to combat dissatisfaction. ~ Bertolt Brecht

If you don't have fun, you don't have a show. ~ Bertolt Brecht