Brecht on Theatre The Development of an Aesthetic

by Brecht, Bertolt; Willett, John; Giles, Steve; Silberman, Marc; Kuhn, Tom

• ISBN13: 9780809005420
• ISBN10: 0809005425
• Edition: Revised
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1964-01-01
• Publisher: Hill and Wang

Summary

This volume offers a major selection of Bertolt Brecht's groundbreaking critical writing. Here, arranged in chronological order, are essays from 1918 to 1956, in which Brecht explores his definition of the Epic Theatre and his theory of alienation-effects in directing, acting, and writing, and discusses, among other works, "The Threepenny Opera, Mahagonny, Mother Courage, Puntila, "and "Galileo," Also included is "A Short Organum for the Theatre," Brecht's most complete exposition of his revolutionary philosophy of drama. Translated and edited by John Willett, "Brecht on Theater" is essential to an understanding of one of the twentieth century's most influential dramatists.

Author Biography

Bertolt Bertolt (1898-1956) was the most influential German dramatist and theoretician of the theater in the 20th century. Also a poet of formidable gifts and considerable output, Brecht first attracted attention in the Berlin of the 1920s as the author of provocative plays that challenged the tenets of traditional theater. Forced to flee Germany in 1933 because of his leftist political beliefs and opposition to the Nazi regime of Adolf Hitler, Brecht and his family spent 14 years in exile in Scandinavia and the United States. Although he tried hard to become established in the United States, Brecht failed to make a breakthrough either as a scriptwriter in Hollywood, California, or as a playwright on Broadway. Two years later he moved to East Berlin and remained there until his death. In the 1950s he became an internationally acclaimed playwright and director through productions of his plays by the Berliner Ensemble, a company based in East Berlin and headed by his wife, actor Helene Weigel.

John Willett (1917-2002) was a noted scholar, author and translator. From the outset he was the prime editor and translator (with Ralph Manheim and others) behind Brecht in English. He was involved in the planning and translation of the programme book for the Berliner Ensemble's celebrated first visit to London in 1956 (the year of Brecht's own death); in 1959 he published the first general study in any language, The Theatre of Bertolt Brecht; he translated, edited and introduced the enormously influential Brecht on Theatre (1964); and he was a founding member of the International Brecht Society and sometime editor of its Yearbook.

Table of Contents

Introduction	xiii
PART ONE 1918-1932
Frank Wedekind	3	(1)
A Reckoning	4	(2)
Emphasis on Sport	6	(4)
Three Cheers for Shaw	10	(4)
Conversation with Bert Brecht	14	(4)
A Radio Speech	18	(2)
Shouldn't we Abolish Aesthetics?	20	(2)
The Epic Theatre and its Difficulties	22	(2)
Last Stage: Oedipus	24	(2)
A Dialogue about Acting	26	(3)
On Form and Subject-Matter	29	(2)
An Example of Paedagogics	31	(2)
The Modern Theatre is the Epic Theatre	33	(10)
The Literarization of the Theatre	43	(4)
The Film, the Novel and Epic Theatre	47	(4)
The Radio as an Apparatus of Communication	51	(2)
The Question of Criteria for Judging Acting	53	(4)
Indirect Impact of the Epic Theatre	57	(8)
PART TWO 1933-1947
Interview with an Exile	65	(4)
Theatre for Pleasure or Theatre for Instruction	69	(8)
The German Drama: pre-Hitler	77	(4)
Criticism of the New York Production of Die Mutter	81	(3)
On the Use of Music in an Epic Theatre	84	(7)
Alienation Effects in Chinese Acting	91	(9)
Notes to Die Rundkopfe und die Spitzkopfe	100	(4)
On Gestic Music	104	(3)
The Popular and the Realistic	107	(8)
On Rhymeless Verse with Irregular Rhythms	115	(6)
The Street Scene	121	(9)
On Experimental Theatre	130	(6)
New Technique of Acting	136	(12)
Two Essays on Unprofessional Acting	148	(5)
Notes on the Folk Play	153	(4)
Alienation Effects in the Narrative Pictures of the Elder Brueghel	157	(2)
A Little Private Tuition for my Friend Max Gorelik	159	(4)
Building up a Part: Laughton's Galileo	163	(6)
`Der Messingkauf': an editorial note	169	(10)
PART THREE 1947-1948
A Short Organum for the Theatre	179	(30)
PART FOUR 1948-1956
Masterful Treatment of a Model	209	(6)
From the Mother Courage Model	215	(7)
Does Use of the Model Restrict the Artist's Freedom's	222	(4)
Formal Problems Arising from the Theatre's New Content	226	(4)
Stage Design for the Epic Theatre	230	(3)
From a Letter to an Actor	233	(3)
Some of the Things that can be Learnt from Stanislavsky	236	(3)
Theaterarbeit: an editorial note	239	(8)
Notes on Erwin Strittmatter's Play Katzgraben	247	(5)
Study of the First Scene of Shakespeare's Coriolanus	252	(14)
Cultural Policy and Academy of Arts	266	(4)
Conversation about being Forced into Empathy	270	(2)
Classical Status as an Inhibiting Factor	272	(2)
Can the Present-day World be Reproduced by Means of Theatre?	274	(2)
Appendices to the `Short Organum'	276	(5)
`Dialectics in the Theatre': an editorial note	281	(2)
Our London Season	283	(1)
Other English Translations	284	(2)
Index	286