Mother Courage and Her Children

Mother Courage and Her Children is a play by Bertolt Brecht. Reportedly he wrote it within the span of an intense month.

Bertolt Brecht wrote the script for Mother Courage and Her Children in 1939, drawing parallels to the turn of events in Europe just before the outbreak of World War II. The original title in German is Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder. It has been translated into the Norwegian in different versions, as Mor Courage og barna hennes, and as Mor Godhjerta.

The action in Mother Courage and Her Children takes place during the European Thirty Years' War of 1618–1648. The war sprang out from a religious conflict and ended as one of the bloodiest and longest wars in European history. The expansive destruction led to enormous human migration, illness and epidemics. Europe became borderless. Civilians from the warring countries fled across borders, hoping for safety in other countries.

Mother Courage follows the war around Europe with her three children and her food tent, selling goods to the warring parties to make money. During the play she loses all her children to the war. Brecht underlines that war has nothing to do with religion, but that it is a capitalist system made to serve the few people on top - not the warlords, but the businessmen.