Ideas as Infection Theme Analysis

The deadly bubonic plague ripped through Italy during Galileo’s life, and in Brecht’s time, hundreds of years later, an influenza outbreak gripped the entire world. Both Galileo and Brecht’s societies went to great (and sometimes inhumane) lengths to stop disease from spreading, often by segregating the sick from the healthy, a method that had limited success. Not surprisingly, then, the idea of plague looms large in Life of Galileo, and it becomes a metaphor for the way in which powerful institutions try to stem the flow of ideas that challenge their authority. Thus, Life of Galileo positions ideas as a kind of contagion, and shows that attempts to keep people from coming into contact with knowledge are repressive and ultimately ineffective. Just like viruses, ideas tend to spread quickly and uncontrollably to others.

Because of the Church’s authority, Catholics in Life of Galileo tend to recoil from Galileo’s ideas just as they would from the plague. For example, when Galileo’s housekeeper (Mrs. Sarti) is discovered to have contracted the plague, the townsfolk run past Galileo’s home, whispering in fear and refusing to answer him when he speaks to them because they are afraid of catching the disease. Similarly, when they pass by him in the hall of the Inquisition, they refuse to greet him lest they be seen as supporting his ideas. Brecht strengthens this parallel through minstrel performances. The plague inspired travelling minstrel performers to depict those suffering from the disease, and the minstrels in Life of Galileo also sing songs about how horrible Galileo is.

Yet, once someone begins to understand Galileo’s new knowledge, they start instantly to spread it—as the housekeeper’s son, Andrea, does. The second that Andrea begins to learn that the sun doesn’t revolve around the Earth, he starts to teach it to his mother. Later, he does the same for Cosimo, the Grand Duke of Florence. Galileo’s lens grinder, Federzoni, is no different. Though he has been only recently exposed to Galileo’s new ideas, he quickly presents them to a group of government astronomers and physicists who are amazed at his impertinence. Even those who should be strongly immune to his message, such as the Little Monk, fall under the sway of the “disease.” The Little Monk is classically educated in philosophy and religion and he has Church-approved knowledge in mathematics. These should work as “antibodies” to Galileo’s “virus.” Indeed, it seems that the Little Monk hopes to cure Galileo of his infection by using these resources. Nevertheless, being in Galileo’s presence for only a short time is enough to infect the Little Monk.

At the heart of Galileo’s ideas is the premise that one must question everything. This, even more than his specific questioning of Aristotle, is the core of Galileo’s infection. As the Inquisitor points out to Barberini, Galileo has caused a veritable plague of doubting within Italy and elsewhere. The idea that the Church was wrong about one of its most central tenants has caused many to doubt its other doctrines, and perhaps even faith itself. Since Galileo, for instance, sea captains have begun to place their belief in star charts and compasses rather than God. The minstrel singers of the plague suggest that such questioning has extended even further into the realm of social life. After becoming infected with Galileo’s questioning manner, for instance, tenants now berate their landlords, wives question whether they might achieve sexual satisfaction with men besides their husbands, and apprentices lie in bed rather than working. “Independent spirit,” he warns, “spreads like foul diseases.”

Like Galileo, Brecht had firm and iconoclastic ideas that he hoped would spread like a contagion. His ideas centered on the theater, an arena that (like Galileo’s astronomy) had also been dominated for centuries by the theories of Aristotle (in this context, the idea that the theater should imitate reality as closely as possible). Brecht thought that the theater could be an amazing tool for encouraging intellectual debate and politicizing the masses, but that the naturalistic style prescribed by Aristotle had limited the theater’s political efficacy. Brecht didn’t want people getting wrapped up emotionally in his works; instead, he wanted them to think about the plays—to remember that they were a work of artistic artifice and not real life. Like Galileo’s infectious ideas, Brecht’s ideas on the theater angered some critics and probably scared them. And they spread. Most serious theater directors to this day work in the shadow of Brecht—whether in sympathy, in opposition, or in some combination of the two—which shows the continuing ability of Brecht’s thought to “infect” others.