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| Copenhagen is a brilliant but troubling play. Set in an ethereal
afterlife, two dead physicists involved in the development of the atom bomb
reminisce about their friendship, their science, and their implication in
the horrors of Nazi Germany and Hiroshima. It sounds grim, but is supertense
and packed with intrigue. Remorse invades every silence, and the scientists
cannot but dwell on the political implications of their discoveries. But
Frayn's play never fully deals with the question of responsibility, and
there is a sense that a devastating premise is wasted.
In September 1941 the German physicist Werner Heisenberg and Danish physicist Niels Bohr met in occupied Copenhagen. Heisenberg had once been the prodigal son of the regal physicist Bohr, but he is now working for the Nazi regime while Bohr, half-Jewish, sees his life threatened and his country trampled. The meeting, then, is not likely to be a happy one, and even today a great deal of myth and mystique surrounds what might have been said. During the play Heisenberg offers several explanations for his visit, any, all or none of which could be true. What is certain is that the atom bomb was high on the agenda. Was Heisenberg creating the bomb for Hitler, and did Bohr know whether the Allies were further ahead in their nuclear efforts? Frayn succeeds magnificently in drawing us into the not obviously appealing world of very difficult physics. The manner in which Heisenberg and Bohr elaborate and argue about tricky-sounding notions from quantum mechanics somehow makes it all seem very obvious, and the audience cannot help but feel slightly more intelligent than before the play began. The fact that these theoretical principles led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people is a factor. But it is the connection of the behaviour of atoms to the behaviour of people that fascinates us for a moment. Just as a particle can never be located with utter certainty, so Heisenberg realises he can never quite know himself or know what he is doing. And just as particles behave differently when under observation, so the characters are under the observation of each other, a third character (Bohr's wife), and the surveillance of the Nazi secret police. There is an elegance between form and content, and one cannot help feeling a slight elation and ego boost when this becomes clear. Nevertheless, Frayn is playing a dangerous game. On the one hand, if human action is reducible to mechanics, then we are absolved of our crimes. On the other, at the end of the play each character throws in the towel and sighs "well, we'll all be dust one day anyway". What? Two hours of big brain theories and ethical dilemmas of a world-historic scale, and none of it really matters? The performance of the play was no more than adequate. The actors often garbled their lines, though in a long play of little action there was a lot of script to learn. The wife came across as a one-dimensional harridan. The lighting and stage design obscured the actors' faces. These details are perhaps less relevant in a play of ideas, and the bond between Heisenberg and Bohr had some feeling, but it is to be hoped the presentation at future showings improves. Copenhagen should be seen. It explores both an important and unresolved historical moment, and the enduring relationship between science and power. It is a compelling and sometimes ingenious play that gets the mind racing. And it will make you feel like you understand Einstein. Ben O'Loughlin, 13th May 2003 |
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