The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui
49 pages • 1-hour read
Bertolt BrechtThe Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui
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Character Analysis
Arturo Ui
Arturo Ui is a man in pursuit of power. He has a great capacity for violence, but—at the beginning of the play—he is stuck in a rut. His reputation as a violent man means that few people are willing to do business with him. He is looked down upon by the business community, represented by the men in the Cauliflower Trust. Since he feels marginalized, his violent tendencies and his vicious temperament fester and seethe. Thus, at the play’s opening, he feels powerless. This feeling of powerlessness is metastasizing into an increasingly violent methodology.
Significantly, Ui’s rise to power is facilitated through the corruption of others, highlighting The Dangers of Greed and Self-Interest. When the Cauliflower Trust embroils Dogsborough in a corruption scandal, Ui is ready to pounce. Ui may seem a formidable figure, but he is still inherently limited and fundamentally reliant on the failures of other people to further his own career. He is not an unstoppable force of nature, but an opportunistic, brutal charlatan who makes the most of his situation. In this sense, Brecht seeks to strip away the delusions of grandeur and greatness that become attached to authoritarian leaders, reminding the audience that they have power in their own right.
An important part of Ui’s characterization is the extent to which he relies on performance. This is most pronounced in the scene where he receives acting lessons, yet there is a clear discrepancy between the public and the private Ui. In public, Ui strives to present himself as a captivating and charismatic presence. His acting lessons help with this, but he becomes increasingly comfortable in his public speaking until his speeches take on a markedly Shakespearean quality. At the same time, however, the Ui glimpsed in private is melancholic and paranoid. He dwells moodily in his hotel room, sulking at his ineffective plans or turning against his most loyal friends due to rumors spread by his own staff.
Navigating these two very different personas becomes a challenge for Ui. In effect, he is attempting to become the author of his own story, which is why he frequently reiterates his autobiography. He describes how he came from nothing in his ascent to power, charting his rise as a battle against the odds. He casts himself as the hero in his own story, embodying the Shakespearean protagonist in an almost delusional manner. He strives to convince the world that his public persona is real, thereby banishing the sense of powerlessness that occupies his thoughts in private. In the battle between his public and private selves, the general population is the real victim.
The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui stops at the moment of his greatest victory. When he takes power, he becomes his public persona. He imposes himself on the world around him, forcing his manufactured identity on everyone else. The story ends here because the play is a warning to the audience about the dangers of fascism. Ui must be stopped, the play urges, just as Adolf Hitler (Ui’s historical analogy) was stopped. By choosing to portray the rise, rather than the downfall, Brecht leaves the audience with a sense of responsibility. The implied downfall of Arturo Ui is left up to the audience to create.
Ernesto Roma
Ernesto Roma is one of Ui’s lieutenants. Significantly, he is the most loyal and sincere in his support for the leader. While figures like Giri and Givola have their own interests and agendas, Roma is completely dedicated to raising Ui’s public profile and helping him seize power. Ui recognizes these qualities when he refers to Roma as his “oldest friend and most loyal lieutenant” (61). As evidence of this trust, he shares his plans with Roma alone, trusting his friend to keep the plans confidential.
At the same time, Roma delights in the status he has. He loves Ui as a friend, but he also loves being recognized as Ui’s friend. He believes that furthering Ui’s cause will further his own. This is why he is so willing to indulge in violence: Roma is a violent thug, but also someone who believes in the power of violence and spectacle. His violence is absurd, obscene, and effective, meaning that he is a useful tool for Ui to deploy, just as Ui is seen as a useful tool by the Cauliflower Trust.
Throughout the play, Roma tries to alert Ui to the conspiracies and plots against him. He warns that Giri and Givola are planning to move against Ui and he is not afraid to confront either man, sincerely believing that he is protecting Ui by doing so. However, despite how much Ui says that he trusts Roma, he quickly turns against him. Ui is more willing to believe Giri and Givola than his friend, so he arranges for Roma to be killed. The loyalty and friendship mean nothing to Ui, whereas they meant everything to Roma. He becomes just another victim of Ui’s desperate quest for power.
While many people are killed in the play, Roma’s death is the only one that seems to have lasting implications for Ui. Ui cannot forget that he has killed his friend, perhaps due to his suspicion that he was tricked by his other lieutenants. In this case, his paranoia is vindicated, as Roma’s death was unnecessary and only serves to isolate Ui further. Roma haunts Ui in his dreams, fostering a sense of guilt in Ui’s consciousness for the first time, a foreshadowing of the guilt and paranoia that may eventually overwhelm him. The play ends without this paranoia becoming manifest, however, so Roma’s ghost hints at a possible fate for Ui: To be brought down by his own guilt or by a similar sort of betrayal.
Old Dogsborough
By the time the play begins, Old Dogsborough is past his best. Once a member of the Cauliflower Trust, he decided to leave the Trust to enter politics. This move was very successful, and he became a well-respected figure in the community. His reputation is initially immaculate.
In this respect, Dogsborough represents an older, more respectable, and more innocent era of politics. In the context of the allegorical nature of the play, he represents Paul von Hindenburg, the decorated soldier who became Chancellor of Germany in 1925. Like Hindenburg, Dogsborough is a throwback to a bygone era who is ill-equipped to deal with the rise of a violent force in the shape of Arturo Ui (or, in Hindenburg’s case, Adolf Hitler). The respectability of the character becomes the departure point, the innocence against which his mistakes will be judged.
Dogsborough may have an immaculate reputation but he becomes embroiled in a corruption scandal. Since he is so respectable, his involvement casts doubt on the legitimacy of all the institutions he represents. Dogsborough becomes the vehicle through which Ui is able to challenge existing institutional legitimacy and condemn the world around him as corrupt, with Ui suggesting that the entire system cannot be trusted. Ui uses this information to blackmail Dogsborough and, in doing so, reveals that Dogsborough is just as vain, prideful, and as self-interested as everyone else. He caves to Ui’s demands rather than sacrifice his reputation. He fails to stand up to Ui due to his own pride, thereby ushering in the era of violence Ui represents.
In the last stages of his life, Dogsborough seeks redemption. He tries to write a confession in the form of his will, admitting to everything that allowed Ui to seize power. This last desperate gesture toward honesty and legitimacy is tragically doomed. His confession is intercepted and rewritten by Ui’s men, meaning that Dogsborough dies without redemption. He acted too late and paid the cost by being damned by history as Ui’s enabler.
Furthermore, the way Ui’s lieutenants rewrite his will to benefit themselves shows how they have no respect for Dogsborough. Even in death, they trample over his memory. As Hindenburg is now remembered for ushering in the era of Nazi rule, Dogsborough becomes a footnote in the life of a violent criminal rather than being remembered in his own right.
Bowl
At one time, Bowl worked as an accountant for Sheet. He was part of the business set up in the dockyards and—to all intents and purposes—lived a normal life. Following the transfer of the dockyards to Dogsborough, however, Bowl loses his job. He is thrown out by the new owner with a callous disregard for his previous service. This dismissal radicalizes Bowl into action; he goes to Ui and reveals the truth about the corruption on the docks, becoming the catalyst for Ui’s power grab.
Bowl is not motivated by some desire to see justice done. He does not go to the authorities or the media to reveal the corruption. Instead, he tries to weaponize his knowledge to seek revenge against the people whom he believes have wronged him. In effect, he is the same as the businessmen who try to use Ui’s violence for their own ends. Like them, he believes that he is smarter than Ui and able to direct Ui’s violence for his own purposes. He is an example of how Ui is able to capitalize on others’ bitterness and resentment to fuel his rise to power.
As Bowl prepares to testify in court against Dogsborough, he is murdered. Bowl is gunned down on the steps of the courthouse by Ui’s men, an example of how violence frequently rebounds back against those who believe that they can use it for their own ends. Like Dogsborough and the Trust, Bowl suffers at the hands of the same violent forces he wishes to deploy against others. Bowl’s fate is a cautionary tale, illustrating how even minor and irrelevant figures can get swept up in—and punished by—the same forces that tempt more major figures.
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