This production was performed at the QEH Theatre, Bristol and The Wroughton Theatre, Bath
Mother Courage and her children travel through the war zone, first in Scandinavia during the war between Poland and Denmark, and then throughout what is now Germany in the Thirty Years War.
She is a travelling merchant, a camp-follower of the war, forever buying and selling from a cart which she and her children drag through the battlefields. Her attitude to war, politics and religion is entirely sceptical. The only things which matter to her are making money and protecting her children. Her cynicism is lit up with a heavy sense of humour -the play is full of her dry jokes about men, generals and gods.
The point of the play is simple. War devours everybody except those at the very top. Even Mother Courage, who tries to play by its rules, is struck down by it. Both her main aims are viciously frustrated. She ends the play with nothing -except her indomitable spirit.
