Mother Courage and Her Children (Hofmann)

For years through the terrible Thirty Years War Mother Courage has followed the Swedish armies with her mobile canteen, and her three children (each by a different man). Life during war is reduced simply to a series of business transactions: soldiers rob peasants and steal from their own stores, peasants sell their last cherished possessions. Mother Courage's business and motherly instincts constantly betray her. Finally, alone, she hitches herself to her wagon and continues to follow the army.