black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

When the leaders speak of peace, the common folk know war is coming.

Bertolt Brecht

Of all the works of man I like best Those which have been used. The copper pots with their dents and flattened edges The knives and forks whose wooden handles Have been worn away by many hands: such forms Seemed to me the noblest.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Approaching Folk Hands Knives Men
Reality changes; in order to represent it, modes of representation must also change. Nothing comes from nothing; the new comes from the old, but that is why it is new.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Change Nothing Reality Representation
For time flows on, and if it did not, it would be a bad prospect for those who do not sit at golden tables.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Order Reality Tables
Little changes are the enemies of great changes.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Change Enemy Littles
If you fight you might lose, if you don’t you have already lost.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Fighting Lost
General, your bomber is powerful. It flies faster than a storm and carries more than an elephant. But it has one defect: It needs a mechanic. General, man is very useful. He can fly and he can kill. But he has one defect: He can think.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Bother Carries Defect Faster General Man Storm
In my view, the great and complicated things that go on in the world cannot be adequately recognized by people who do not use every possible aid to understanding.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Adequately Great Recognized Understanding
The mill wheel turns, it turns forever, though what is uppermost remains not so.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Forever Mills Wheels
Sin is what is new, strong, surprising, strange. The theatre must take an interest in sin if the young are to be able to go there.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Able Strong Theatre
What’s breaking into a bank compared with founding a bank?
BERTOLT BRECHT

Banking Breaking Literature Silence
Our audience must experience not only the ways to free Prometheus, but be schooled in the very desire to free him. Theater must teach all the pleasures and joys of discovery, all the feelings of triumph associated with liberation.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Audience Discovery Experience Joy Pleasure Schooled
The newspaper The dog Dialectics Showering, swimming Old music Comfortable shoes Comprehension New music Writing, planting Traveling Singing Being friendly
BERTOLT BRECHT

Comfortable Dog Newspaper Planting Shoe Singing
People who fight may lose. People who do not fight have already lost.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Fighting May People
He who fights, can lose. He who doesn’t fight, has already lost.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Fighting Loses Lost
The worst illiterate is the political illiterate. He hears nothing, sees nothing, takes no part in political life. He doesn’t seem to know that the cost of living, the price of beans, of flour, of rent, of medicines all depend on political decisions.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Children Hate Ignorance
If art reflects life, it does so with special mirrors.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Art Mirrors Special
It was never decreed that a god mustn’t pay hotel bills.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Bills Hotel Pay
For the task assigned them Men aren’t smart enough or sly Any rogue can blind them With a clever lie.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Clever Lying Smart
First the pork chops, then morality
BERTOLT BRECHT

Firsts Morality Pork
People cannot remain good unless good is expected of them.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Expected Good People Remain
Nowadays, anyone who wishes to combat lies and ignorance and to write the truth must overcome at least five difficulties.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Lying Running Writing
He who speaks of enemies , himself is the enemy.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Enemy Himself Speak
One can describe the world of today to the people of today only if one describes it as capable of alteration.
BERTOLT BRECHT

People Today World
Young Alexander conquered India. He alone? Caesar beat the Gauls. Was there not even a cook in his army? Philip of Spain wept as his fleet was sunk and destroyed. Were there no other tears? Frederick the Great triumphed in the Seven Years War. Who Triumphed with him?
BERTOLT BRECHT

Army War Years
Unhappiness doesn’t grow on the chest like leprosy. Poverty won’t fall off the roof like a loose tile, no; poverty and unhappiness are man’s doing.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Fall Men Tiles
Come in, dear wind, and be our guest You too have neither home nor rest.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Guest Home Wind
Writers can’t write as fast as governments make wars; because to write demands thinking.
BERTOLT BRECHT

Thinking War Writing

When the leaders speak of peace, the common folk know war is coming.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

When the leaders speak of peace, the common folk know war is coming.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Bertolt Brecht Quotes