Round Heads and Pointed Heads

Round Heads and Pointed Heads

"Round Heads and Pointed Heads" (German: "Die Rundeköpfe und die Spitzköpfe"), sometimes translated as "Round Heads and Peaked Heads" or "Roundheads and Pointheads", is a play by the German dramatist Bertolt Brecht, with songs by his frequent collaborator Hanns Eisler. Originally begun as an adaptation of Shakespeare's "Measure for Measure", its roots are almost unrecognizable in the final version, which is a satirical anti-Nazi parable about a fictitious country in which the rulers maintain their control by setting the people with round heads against those with pointed heads.

The play was initially produced in Copenhagen while Brecht was in exile from Nazi Germany there. It opened on November 4, 1936, to mixed reactions. Brecht was not upset by this — he remarked some years later that he had seen some people crying at the same scene that others were laughing at, "And I was satisfied with both." [Frederic Ewen. "Bertolt Brecht: His Life, His Art and His Times", (1967), citing "Anmerkung zu Rundköpfe..." in "Stücke" VI (1957-1967)]

Unlike others of his lesser works, Brecht included "Round Heads and Pointed Heads" in his collected works of 1955.

Notes


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