'Murderer's House' - University of Victoria

Brecht‟s pale mother is a mother of sons. The daughters are not mentioned. Somehow
the poem doesn‟t describe the feelings of this mother and how much she suffers herself
from what her sons have done to her. It‟s not really shown, it‟s not really said…He
mentions it…Whereas my film speaks about the child and the mother in the context that
they are mother and daughter, out of a line of women.
R.R.: Okay. So you‟re taking up where the Brecht poem left off.
H.S.-B.: Yes, and I take up my own experience as a woman.
R.R.: Did you have difficulty finding some kind of poem or some piece of literature that
described the relationship between mother and daughter? Is that why you chose the
Brecht poem?
H.S.-B.: No, I have known this Brecht poem for a very long time. I was very fond of
Brecht in my youth, very very fond of him. I knew all of his theatre plays; I still know a
lot of his poems and songs.
R.R.: I learned my German in Augsburg which is where Brecht was born, but he didn‟t
stay there very long. He didn‟t like Augsburg very much I think.
You use documentary footage and radio in this film in a very interesting way. In my
opinion, the documentary footage and radio broadcasts help create the historical and
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