Wayman Barnes
Matthew Gonzales (Friday 11-12)
Comparative Literature 60 AC
2 November 2016
Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht was a German playwright, poet, critic, fiction writer, and modernist (as well as being a distinctive dresser. If you were to dress-up as European intellectual for Halloween, you’d most likely copy the look of Brecht: small, round glasses, dark clothes, and big, heavy coats). Many of his most popular plays were musicals and remain in perpetual productions to this day. It is likely that wherever you grew up the local, community playhouse performed one of his plays. The Threepenny Opera, Mother Courage and Her Children, and The Caucasian Chalk Circle are ones you may recognize. At the very least, you will have heard some of the songs he famously wrote with Kurt Weill: “Mack the Knife” and “Alabama Song” (see videos below).
Brecht's plays were overtly political and concerned with class struggles, nationalist duty, and heroism (which he viewed negatively). Brecht considered himself a dialectical materialist; his views informed by his readings of Hegel and Marx.
The early part of his career was in Munich and then Berlin and coincided with the early rise of the Nazi party. Because of this threat, Brecht left Germany and went into exile in Scandinavia and later the United States. After World War II, Brecht returned to Europe and decided to settle in East Germany. Brecht thought his work would be widely accepted in the Communist Bloc. Unfortunately for him, Brecht was wrong. As I already mentioned, Brecht's work has been widely circulated in the United States. In the fifties and sixties, Brecht’s songs were often performed by African-American Jazz artists. Brecht’s down-trodden characters seemed to resonate with these performers. While researching for this post, I saw a performance of Nina Simone where she said that she would be singing a song by Brecht and Weill about a servant girl who wanted to murder her boss, but Simone's version of the song would be “taking place in South Carolina.”
The reason I think Brecht is important for our class is his theories regarding drama. In a similar way as the authors we have studied have used techniques to keep things on the surface, Brecht wanted to make sure the theater audience were constantly made aware that they were watching a play. Brecht made sure the audience did not escape into the story, but were being critical of it. Brecht did this by using intense lights so the audience attention would not drift. Brecht also left the stage sets and equipment visible so there were always reminders of the falsity of the experience. The goal was to create detachment and alienation in the audience. Brecht believed if he could achieve this state in the audience he was in charge of how the information he was trying to convey was processed. Brecht wanted the audience to believe in the same way he did after seeing the play he had written. For Brecht, a modernist approach allowed him to have control over how an audience thought, or, at the very least, made them critically engaged.
As far as capturing the American voice? ... well, Brecht was German so I doubt he did that well in that regard. However, he did have Nina Simone doing what she could to help him out, so maybe he succeeded after all.
As far as capturing the American voice? ... well, Brecht was German so I doubt he did that well in that regard. However, he did have Nina Simone doing what she could to help him out, so maybe he succeeded after all.
Discussion questions:
- Why would African-American performers find commonality with the down-trodden characters in Brecht’s plays and songs? Is it easier to identify with another lower class if it is in a different country and not being repressed by the same governance?
- In a similar fashion to Brecht’s theory of audience alienation, is the modernist a form of control in order to make an audience think in a specific way? If so, is this a good or bad thing?
Jacobs, Lee A. “Bertolt Brecht.” The Bedford Introduction to Drama. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1989.
Karsh, Agnieszka. “Theatre for the People: The Impact of Brechtian Theory on the Production and Performance of 1789 by Ariane Mnouchkine’s Theatre du Soleil.” Opticon 1826, Issue 10, Spring 2011. Accessed 30 October 2016. Web.
Very interesting piece! I think that drawing parallels from the struggle of poor Europeans to the struggle of poor African Americans in the 20th century helped to frame the African American struggle in perspective and make it more...understandable for privileged Americans! People of all class backgrounds in the United States loved jazz music and black performers, and by conveying their struggles in terms white people could understand, perhaps these performers made an impact on the views of their audiences!
ReplyDeleteThe idea of audience alienation really stood out to me. Modernism can be thought of in a similar way in that modernists tried to make their readers think differently. They aimed to shock their reader and provide different points of view so that they weren't always thinking in the same way. Similarly, Brecht wants to make his audience think differently. Both Brecht and modernists aimed alter the way their audience viewed their work by revealing or hiding certain aspects of their work, causing the audience to think differently.
ReplyDeleteI find the conclusion to your blog post especially interesting concerning Brecht's determination for the audience of a play to stay disconnected from the work and perceive it as a play, instead of a genuine story. As a result, he could manipulate his audience into understanding the work in the specific way he wanted. I think this connects to our course because of the recent novels we have read in which the author is making it clear that the novel is or text is a story. For example, in Their Eyes Were Watching God, Hurston constructs the text through Janey's story of telling it to Phoeby. We are constantly being brought back to the surface conversation between Phoeby and Janey to be reminded that she is telling a story and it is a flashback.
ReplyDeleteBrecht's desire to remove the audience from the story line and ensure they perceived it critically instead of emotionally definitely relates to the texts we have read. Many characters we have met, such as those in "Melanctha," and The 42nd Parallel, were very flat and lacked emotional depth. Because of this, it is suggested that the characters are not there for the readers to relate to them but to be used as pawns by the author to convey a point or purpose. In this way, Brecht didn't intend for the viewers to be emotionally immersed in the drama and plot of the play, but to come to understand and possibly agree with Brecht's point of view as conveyed throughout the show.
ReplyDeleteBeautifully written and organized! The connection between European class oppression and racism in the North American South proves that, regardless of country or location, there will always be an issue of suppression and outsiders fighting for a voice.
ReplyDeleteAdditionally, Brecht's technique of disconnecting the audience is key in modernist literature. He is making us aware of the process of sensational perception, and moreover by the objects themselves. This highly resembles the style used by William Carlos Williams, who also focused on simple, tangible things to change the way the reader perceives the work of art. To answer your question, I believe alienation is a part of modernism, more specifically, the recognition of alienation. In this way, Brecht and modernism collide.
I this this focus on a figure! I had never heard of Brecht, so I am glad you brought him to light. I think they way you explore the structure of his plays highlights it as very fascinating but also very purposeful. It seems that the modern twist Brecht was incorporating was very in touch with enlightening reality: "class struggles, nationalist duty, and heroism". It seems that in many modernist works, like Passing and The 42nd Parallel these artists are using new forms of expression not only to just insight interest but also to start conversations about real topics. I think, based on your summary, that Brecht is a great example of this effort.
ReplyDeleteYour biography of Brecht really stood out to me because compared to the other artists and figures we've discussed through these blog posts, he definitely brings a different element to the ongoing discussion of Modernism in our class. When you mentioned the way in which Brecht would blatantly emphasize the falsity in his stage productions, this reminded me a lot of when we read Melanctha at the beginning of the semester and many agreed that they felt absolutely no attachment to any of the characters. As you said, this characteristic in Brecht's works really served to allow the viewer to remain critically engaged. Great post (and funny too)!
ReplyDeleteThis is really interesting! I don't think we've had many posts on individual people before. I thought the idea of audience alienation was very intriguing because it seems to be the opposite of what traditional artists want with their work; instead of trying to make his audience relate subconsciously to his characters, Brecht wanted them to think differently and in a conscious manner while reading or watching his work. I agree with what Sarah said, about this being similar to modernist artists who wanted their audiences to think differently about their work.
ReplyDeleteI definitely feel like Faulkner also intends to stop the reader from "escaping into the story." The strangeness of Faulkner's prose style makes it hard to get immersed in the reading and always leaves the reader in the analytical mode, in which the text is processed at a conscious level. It's really interesting to connect this approach to someone working in another medium.
ReplyDeleteThat was really interesting! I think that people often forget that people around the world experience the same emotions of happiness, sadness, fear and anger. Even though the place and scenery may be different, people across the global can still connect with each other because their feelings and experiences are probably more similar than they think. Nina Simone was able to use Brecht's song because the meaning of the music to her was the same.
ReplyDeleteYour post was really fascinating! The idea of the alienation of the audience is perfectly in line the modernist effort to explore the sensory experience. Brecht caused his audience to think the way he wanted them to perceive his shows. In his techniques, the crowd must be more focused on the alienation of the experience rather than the actual play.
ReplyDeleteI found it especially interesting that Brecht sought to alienate his audience to keep viewers critical of his plays, a concept which seems to be in opposition to plays and works of literature that attempt to engage and incorporate the audience into the work. This challenge to traditional artistic conventions is characteristically modernist. In addition, the connection between Brecht and African American artists illustrates the truly global scale of the modernist movement.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed this. Brecht is an excellent example of the growing modernist movement, and how it was transferred to rest of culture. Alienation of the audience is such an interesting concept he pioneered, in order to fill the audience with his ideas about the shows.
ReplyDeleteI liked how you showed how Brecht had a different approach to connecting with the audience, and how he attempted to break the fourth wall a lot to keep his audience aware and critical of the play they were watching. I find that this style of communication especially pertained to Dos Passos, where he broke up the text to include his own thoughts and ideas through the Camera Eye sections.
ReplyDeleteThe point that I homed in on in this post is that Brecht found heroism to be something negative. I think this is a great point. The idea of the knight in shinning armor does not exist in many, if not all, the texts we have read this semester. Many of the stories end ambiguously or negatively. We, the readers, no longer have clear cut answers of what it means to be a hero. The endings of the books end in death, or someone running into the forest howling.....
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