Life of Galileo
Encyclopedia
Life of Galileo also known as Galileo, is a play by the twentieth-century German
dramatist Bertolt Brecht
. The first version of the play was written between 1937 and 1939; the second (or 'American') version was written between 1945–1947, in collaboration with Charles Laughton
. The play received its first theatrical production at the Zurich Schauspielhaus
, opening on 9 September 1943. This production was directed by Leonard Steckel
, with set-design
by Teo Otto
. The cast included Steckel himself (as Galileo), Karl Paryla and Wolfgang Langhoff
.
The second version opened at the Coronet Theatre
in Los Angeles
on 30 July 1947. This was directed by Joseph Losey
and Brecht, with musical direction by Serge Hovey
and set-design by Robert Davison. Laughton played Galileo, with Hugo Haas
as Barberini and Frances Heflin
as Virginia. This production opened at the Maxine Elliott's Theatre in New York
on 7 December of the same year. A third production, by the Berliner Ensemble
with Ernst Busch
in the title role, opened in January 1957 at the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm
and was directed by Erich Engel
, with set-design by Caspar Neher
. The play was first published in 1940.
A screen adaptation of the play, directed by Joseph Losey for American Film Theatre
, was produced in 1975 under the title Galileo
with Topol
in the title role.
The plot of the play concerns the latter period of the life of Galileo Galilei
, the great Italian Baroque
natural philosopher, who was persecuted by the Roman Catholic Church
for the promulgation of his scientific discoveries; for details, see Galileo affair
. The play embraces such themes as the conflict between dogmatism and scientific evidence
, as well as interrogating the values of constancy in the face of oppression.
from Hitler's Germany (with stopovers in various other countries in between, among them the USSR), Brecht translated and re-worked the first version of his play in collaboration with the actor Charles Laughton
. The result of their efforts was the second 'American version' of the play, entitled simply Galileo, which to this day remains the most widely-staged version in the English-speaking world. The same version formed the basis for Losey's 1975 film adaptation as part of the American Film Theatre series.
In September 1947, Brecht was subpoenaed in the US by the House Un-American Activities Committee
for alleged communist connections. He testified before HUAC on 30 October 1947, and flew to Europe on 31 October. He chose to return to East Germany and continued to work on the play, now once again in the German language. He felt that the optimistic portrait of the scientific project present in the first two versions required revision in a post-Hiroshima world, where science's irrational and harmful potential had become far more apparent. The final German version premiered at Cologne
in April 1955.
Matej Danter offers a readily-accessible and detailed comparison of the early, the American, and the final German versions.
Galileo is short of money. A prospective student tells Galileo about a novel invention, the telescope ("a queer tube thing"), being sold in Amsterdam. Galileo replicates it, but then sells it to the Venetian Republic as his own creation.
Galileo uses the telescope to substantiate Copernicus' heliocentric model
of our solar system
, which is highly incompatible with both popular belief and church doctrine, and which he publishes in vernacular
Italian, rather than traditional scientific Latin
, so that it is accessible by the common people. His daughter's marriage to a well-off young man (with whom she is genuinely in love) fails because of Galileo's reluctance to distance himself from his unorthodox teachings.
Galileo is brought to the Vatican for interrogation. Upon being threatened with torture, he recants his teachings. His students are shocked by his surrender in the face of pressure from the church authorities.
Galileo, old and broken, living under house arrest, is visited by one of his former pupils, Andrea. Galileo gives him a book (Two New Sciences
) containing all his scientific discoveries, asking him to smuggle it out of Italy for dissemination abroad. Andrea now believes Galileo's actions were heroic and that he just recanted to fool the ecclesiastical authorities. However, Galileo insists his actions had nothing to do with heroism but were merely the result of self-interest.
One significant liberty that is taken is the treatment of Galileo's daughter Virginia Gamba (Sister Maria Celeste
), who, rather than becoming engaged, was considered unmarriageable by her father and confined to a convent from the age of thirteen (the bulk of the play), and, further, died of dysentery shortly after her father's recantation. However, Galileo was close with Virginia, and they corresponded extensively.
The discussion of price versus value was a major point of debate in 19th economics, under the terms "value in use" (value) versus "value in exchange" (price). Within Marxian economics
this is discussed under the labor theory of value
.
More subtly, Marx is sometimes interpreted as advocating technological determinism
(technological progress determines social change), which is reflected in the telescope (a technological change) being the root of the scientific progress and hence social unrest.
The mention of tides refers to Galileo's theory that the motion of the earth caused the tides, which would give the desired physical proof of the Earth's movement, and which is discussed in his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems
, whose working title was Dialogue on the Tides. In the event this theory was a failure - Kepler's suggestion that the moon's gravity caused the tides instead being correct.
The bent wooded rail in scene 13 and the discussion that the quickest distance between two points need not be a straight line (the path of fastest descent of a rolling ball being a curve, not a straight line (which is the shortest path)) alludes to Galileo's investigation of the brachistochrone (in the context of the quickest descent from a point to a wall), which he incorrectly believed to be given by a quarter circle. Instead, the brachistochrone is a half cycloid
, which was only proved much later with the development of calculus
.
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
dramatist Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...
. The first version of the play was written between 1937 and 1939; the second (or 'American') version was written between 1945–1947, in collaboration with Charles Laughton
Charles Laughton
Charles Laughton was an English-American stage and film actor, screenwriter, producer and director.-Early life and career:...
. The play received its first theatrical production at the Zurich Schauspielhaus
Schauspielhaus Zürich
The Schauspielhaus Zürich is one of the most prominent and important theatres in the German-speaking world. It is also known as "Pfauenbühne" after its location on the Pfauen Square in Zürich, Switzerland. The large theatre has 750 seats...
, opening on 9 September 1943. This production was directed by Leonard Steckel
Leonard Steckel
Leonard Steckel was a German actor and director of stage and screen. He began his career as a stage actor, and spent the duration of World War II in exile in Zürich, where he had gone to work at the Schauspielhaus...
, with set-design
Scenic design
Scenic design is the creation of theatrical, as well as film or television scenery. Scenic designers have traditionally come from a variety of artistic backgrounds, but nowadays, generally speaking, they are trained professionals, often with M.F.A...
by Teo Otto
Teo Otto
Teo Otto was a Swiss stage designer. He trained in Kassel and Paris and in 1926 taught at the Bauhaus in Weimar. In 1928 he became an assistant at the Berlin Staatsoper...
. The cast included Steckel himself (as Galileo), Karl Paryla and Wolfgang Langhoff
Wolfgang Langhoff
Wolfgang Langhoff was a German theatre, film and television actor and theatre director.-Early career:...
.
The second version opened at the Coronet Theatre
Coronet Theatre
The Coronet Theatre is a longstanding Los Angeles theatre. Many Hollywood stars have played there, and it has been home to several important premiere productions. More than 300 plays have been produced at the Coronet. As of June 2008, the theatre is now Largo at the Coronet Theatre, an expansion...
in Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
on 30 July 1947. This was directed by Joseph Losey
Joseph Losey
Joseph Walton Losey was an American theater and film director. After studying in Germany with Bertolt Brecht, Losey returned to the United States, eventually making his way to Hollywood...
and Brecht, with musical direction by Serge Hovey
Serge Hovey
-Life:Hovey was born in New York City in 1920. He studied piano with Edward Steuermann and composition with Hanns Eisler and Arnold Schoenberg. He was musical director for the first American production of Bertolt Brecht's Life of Galileo in Los Angeles in 1947...
and set-design by Robert Davison. Laughton played Galileo, with Hugo Haas
Hugo Haas
Hugo Haas was a Czech film actor, director and writer. He appeared in over 60 films between 1926 and 1962, as well as directing 20 films between 1933 and 1962....
as Barberini and Frances Heflin
Frances Heflin
Mary Frances Heflin was an American actress.-Life and career:Heflin was born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, the daughter of Fanny Bleecker and Dr. Emmett Evan Heflin, a dentist. She was the sister of Academy Award-winning actor Van Heflin...
as Virginia. This production opened at the Maxine Elliott's Theatre in New York
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
on 7 December of the same year. A third production, by the Berliner Ensemble
Berliner Ensemble
The Berliner Ensemble is a German theatre company established by playwright Bertolt Brecht and his wife, Helene Weigel in January 1949 in East Berlin...
with Ernst Busch
Ernst Busch (actor)
Ernst Busch was a German singer and actor.Busch first rose to prominence as an interpreter of political songs, particularly those of Kurt Tucholsky, in the Berlin Kabarett scene of the 1920s...
in the title role, opened in January 1957 at the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm
Theater am Schiffbauerdamm
The Theater am Schiffbauerdamm is a theatre building at the Schiffbauerdamm riverside in the Mitte district of Berlin, Germany, opened on November 19, 1892. Since 1954 it is home to the Berliner Ensemble theatre company, founded in 1949 by Helene Weigel and Bertolt Brecht.The original name of the...
and was directed by Erich Engel
Erich Engel
Erich Engel was a German film and theatre director.- Biography :Engel was born in Hamburg, where later he studied at the School of Applied Arts...
, with set-design by Caspar Neher
Caspar Neher
Caspar Neher was an Austrian-German scenographer and librettist, known principally for his career-long working relationship with Bertolt Brecht.Neher was born in Augsburg...
. The play was first published in 1940.
A screen adaptation of the play, directed by Joseph Losey for American Film Theatre
American Film Theatre
The American Film Theatre was a limited run series of film adaptations of stage plays, produced by Ely Landau. Two seasons were produced from 1973 to 1975...
, was produced in 1975 under the title Galileo
Galileo (film)
Galileo is a 1975 film version of the Bertolt Brecht play The Life of Galileo. The film was produced and released as part of the American Film Theatre, which adapted theatrical works for a subscription-driven cinema series.-Plot:...
with Topol
Chaim Topol
Chaim Topol , often billed simply as Topol, is an Israeli theatrical and film performer, actor, writer and producer. He has been nominated for an Oscar and Tony Award, and has won two Golden Globes.-Early life:...
in the title role.
The plot of the play concerns the latter period of the life of Galileo Galilei
Galileo Galilei
Galileo Galilei , was an Italian physicist, mathematician, astronomer, and philosopher who played a major role in the Scientific Revolution. His achievements include improvements to the telescope and consequent astronomical observations and support for Copernicanism...
, the great Italian Baroque
Baroque
The Baroque is a period and the style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, literature, dance, and music...
natural philosopher, who was persecuted by the Roman Catholic Church
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the world's largest Christian church, with over a billion members. Led by the Pope, it defines its mission as spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ, administering the sacraments and exercising charity...
for the promulgation of his scientific discoveries; for details, see Galileo affair
Galileo affair
The Galileo affair was a sequence of events, beginning around 1610, during which Galileo Galilei came into conflict with the Aristotelian scientific view of the universe , over his support of Copernican astronomy....
. The play embraces such themes as the conflict between dogmatism and scientific evidence
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...
, as well as interrogating the values of constancy in the face of oppression.
Versions of the play
After emigrating to the United StatesUnited States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
from Hitler's Germany (with stopovers in various other countries in between, among them the USSR), Brecht translated and re-worked the first version of his play in collaboration with the actor Charles Laughton
Charles Laughton
Charles Laughton was an English-American stage and film actor, screenwriter, producer and director.-Early life and career:...
. The result of their efforts was the second 'American version' of the play, entitled simply Galileo, which to this day remains the most widely-staged version in the English-speaking world. The same version formed the basis for Losey's 1975 film adaptation as part of the American Film Theatre series.
In September 1947, Brecht was subpoenaed in the US by the House Un-American Activities Committee
House Un-American Activities Committee
The House Committee on Un-American Activities or House Un-American Activities Committee was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives. In 1969, the House changed the committee's name to "House Committee on Internal Security"...
for alleged communist connections. He testified before HUAC on 30 October 1947, and flew to Europe on 31 October. He chose to return to East Germany and continued to work on the play, now once again in the German language. He felt that the optimistic portrait of the scientific project present in the first two versions required revision in a post-Hiroshima world, where science's irrational and harmful potential had become far more apparent. The final German version premiered at Cologne
Cologne
Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...
in April 1955.
Matej Danter offers a readily-accessible and detailed comparison of the early, the American, and the final German versions.
Synopsis
Galileo uses the telescope to substantiate Copernicus' heliocentric model
Heliocentrism
Heliocentrism, or heliocentricism, is the astronomical model in which the Earth and planets revolve around a stationary Sun at the center of the universe. The word comes from the Greek . Historically, heliocentrism was opposed to geocentrism, which placed the Earth at the center...
of our solar system
Solar System
The Solar System consists of the Sun and the astronomical objects gravitationally bound in orbit around it, all of which formed from the collapse of a giant molecular cloud approximately 4.6 billion years ago. The vast majority of the system's mass is in the Sun...
, which is highly incompatible with both popular belief and church doctrine, and which he publishes in vernacular
Vernacular
A vernacular is the native language or native dialect of a specific population, as opposed to a language of wider communication that is not native to the population, such as a national language or lingua franca.- Etymology :The term is not a recent one...
Italian, rather than traditional scientific Latin
New Latin
The term New Latin, or Neo-Latin, is used to describe the Latin language used in original works created between c. 1500 and c. 1900. Among other uses, Latin during this period was employed in scholarly and scientific publications...
, so that it is accessible by the common people. His daughter's marriage to a well-off young man (with whom she is genuinely in love) fails because of Galileo's reluctance to distance himself from his unorthodox teachings.
Galileo is brought to the Vatican for interrogation. Upon being threatened with torture, he recants his teachings. His students are shocked by his surrender in the face of pressure from the church authorities.
Galileo, old and broken, living under house arrest, is visited by one of his former pupils, Andrea. Galileo gives him a book (Two New Sciences
Two New Sciences
The Discourses and Mathematical Demonstrations Relating to Two New Sciences was Galileo's final book and a sort of scientific testament covering much of his work in physics over the preceding thirty years.After his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, the Roman Inquisition had banned...
) containing all his scientific discoveries, asking him to smuggle it out of Italy for dissemination abroad. Andrea now believes Galileo's actions were heroic and that he just recanted to fool the ecclesiastical authorities. However, Galileo insists his actions had nothing to do with heroism but were merely the result of self-interest.
Historical background
The play stays generally faithful to Galileo's science and timeline thereof, but takes significant liberties with his personal life. Galileo did in fact use a telescope, observe the moons of Jupiter, advocate for the heliocentric model, observe sun spots, investigate buoyancy, and write on physics, and did visit the Vatican twice to defend his work, the second time being made to recant his views, and being confined to house arrest thereafter.One significant liberty that is taken is the treatment of Galileo's daughter Virginia Gamba (Sister Maria Celeste
Maria Celeste
Sister Maria Celeste , born Virginia Gamba, was the daughter of the famous Italian scientist Galileo Galilei and Marina Gamba. She was the eldest of three siblings, with a sister Livia and a brother Vincenzio...
), who, rather than becoming engaged, was considered unmarriageable by her father and confined to a convent from the age of thirteen (the bulk of the play), and, further, died of dysentery shortly after her father's recantation. However, Galileo was close with Virginia, and they corresponded extensively.
Allusions
There are a number of allusions to Galileo's science and to Marxism which are not further elaborated in the play; some of these are glossed below.The discussion of price versus value was a major point of debate in 19th economics, under the terms "value in use" (value) versus "value in exchange" (price). Within Marxian economics
Marxian economics
Marxian economics refers to economic theories on the functioning of capitalism based on the works of Karl Marx. Adherents of Marxian economics, particularly in academia, distinguish it from Marxism as a political ideology and sociological theory, arguing that Marx's approach to understanding the...
this is discussed under the labor theory of value
Labor theory of value
The labor theories of value are heterodox economic theories of value which argue that the value of a commodity is related to the labor needed to produce or obtain that commodity. The concept is most often associated with Marxian economics...
.
More subtly, Marx is sometimes interpreted as advocating technological determinism
Technological determinism
Technological determinism is a reductionist theory that presumes that a society's technology drives the development of its social structure and cultural values. The term is believed to have been coined by Thorstein Veblen , an American sociologist...
(technological progress determines social change), which is reflected in the telescope (a technological change) being the root of the scientific progress and hence social unrest.
The mention of tides refers to Galileo's theory that the motion of the earth caused the tides, which would give the desired physical proof of the Earth's movement, and which is discussed in his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems
Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems
The Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems was a 1632 Italian language book by Galileo Galilei comparing the Copernican system with the traditional Ptolemaic system. It was translated to Latin as Systema cosmicum in 1635 by Matthias Bernegger...
, whose working title was Dialogue on the Tides. In the event this theory was a failure - Kepler's suggestion that the moon's gravity caused the tides instead being correct.
The bent wooded rail in scene 13 and the discussion that the quickest distance between two points need not be a straight line (the path of fastest descent of a rolling ball being a curve, not a straight line (which is the shortest path)) alludes to Galileo's investigation of the brachistochrone (in the context of the quickest descent from a point to a wall), which he incorrectly believed to be given by a quarter circle. Instead, the brachistochrone is a half cycloid
Cycloid
A cycloid is the curve traced by a point on the rim of a circular wheel as the wheel rolls along a straight line.It is an example of a roulette, a curve generated by a curve rolling on another curve....
, which was only proved much later with the development of calculus
Calculus
Calculus is a branch of mathematics focused on limits, functions, derivatives, integrals, and infinite series. This subject constitutes a major part of modern mathematics education. It has two major branches, differential calculus and integral calculus, which are related by the fundamental theorem...
.
Works cited
- Brecht, Bertolt. 1952. Galileo. Trans. Charles Laughton. Ed. Eric Bentley. Works of Bertolt Brecht Ser. New York: Grove Press, 1966. ISBN 0802130593. p. 43–129.
- Brecht, Bertolt. 1955. Life of Galileo. In Collected Plays:Five. Trans. John Willett. Ed. John Willett and Ralph Manheim. Bertolt Brecht: Plays, Poetry and Prose Ser. London: Methuen, 1980. ISBN 0413699706. p. 1–105.
- Danter, Matej. 2001. "History of changes of Brecht's Galileo". Online: New Mexico State University. (accessed 18 March 2006)
- Willett, John. 1959. The Theatre of Bertolt Brecht: A Study from Eight Aspects. London: Methuen. ISBN 041334360X.
- British Royal National Theatre's web page about its production of Galileo