Bertolt Brecht was a visionary in theatre, envisioning an approach to theatre through which we see the actual world of actors on a stage, instead of being swept away by the plot-line. Throughout the 1920's to the 1950's before dying in 1956, Brecht used theatre as a running social commentary on life, political beliefs and social reform. This went against all the current views of the time. Audiences then and still now, used theatre to escape from the harsh realities of life.
"The purpose of the play was to awaken the spectators' minds so that he could communicate his version of the truth." - spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk
Brecht accomplished this by not allowing his actors to become the character at any point in the play, instead they are asked to show the characters actions and responses without becoming that character themselves. They must never identify with their character and are in essence giving their own commentary on these characters through their actions. The ideas are similar to those of Greek theatre in which a story was told through the use of a play, the characters themselves were not represented on the stage, only presented.
Actors break the fourth wall, make scenery shifts in full light view and narrate large portions of the story in order to dissuade audiences from becoming too attached to the actors themselves but rather the characters.
Information cited from:
http://www.cs.brandeis.edu/~jamesf/goodwoman/brecht_epic_theater.html
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAbrecht.htm
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
What is Marxism?
Marxism is an economic and social system based upon the political and economic theories of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Marxism is summed up in the Encarta Reference Library as “a theory in which class struggle is a central element in the analysis of social change in Western societies.” Marxism is the antithesis of capitalism which is defined by Encarta as “an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and distribution of goods, characterized by a free competitive market and motivation by profit.” Marxism is the system of socialism of which the dominant feature is public ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange.
Under capitalism, the proletariat, the working class or “the people,” own only their capacity to work; they have the ability only to sell their own labor. According to Marx a class is defined by the relations of its members to the means of production. He proclaimed that history is the chronology of class struggles, wars, and uprisings. Under capitalism, Marx continues, the workers, in order to support their families are paid a bare minimum wage or salary. The worker is alienated because he has no control over the labor or product which he produces. The capitalists sell the products produced by the workers at a proportional value as related to the labor involved. Surplus value is the difference between what the worker is paid and the price for which the product is sold.
A proletariat or socialist revolution must occur, according to Marx, where the state (the means by which the ruling class forcibly maintains rule over the other classes) is a dictatorship of the proletariat. Communism evolves from socialism out of this progression: the socialist slogan is “From each according to his ability, to each according to his work.” The communist slogan varies thusly: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”
http://www.allaboutphilosophy.org/what-is-marxism-faq.htm
Under capitalism, the proletariat, the working class or “the people,” own only their capacity to work; they have the ability only to sell their own labor. According to Marx a class is defined by the relations of its members to the means of production. He proclaimed that history is the chronology of class struggles, wars, and uprisings. Under capitalism, Marx continues, the workers, in order to support their families are paid a bare minimum wage or salary. The worker is alienated because he has no control over the labor or product which he produces. The capitalists sell the products produced by the workers at a proportional value as related to the labor involved. Surplus value is the difference between what the worker is paid and the price for which the product is sold.
A proletariat or socialist revolution must occur, according to Marx, where the state (the means by which the ruling class forcibly maintains rule over the other classes) is a dictatorship of the proletariat. Communism evolves from socialism out of this progression: the socialist slogan is “From each according to his ability, to each according to his work.” The communist slogan varies thusly: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”
http://www.allaboutphilosophy.org/what-is-marxism-faq.htm
Brief Summary on Socialism
The socialist doctrine demands state ownership and control of the fundamental means of production and distribution of wealth, to be achieved by reconstruction of the existing capitalist or other political system of a country through peaceful, democratic, and parliamentary means. The doctrine specifically advocates nationalization of natural resources, basic industries, banking and credit facilities, and public utilities. It places special emphasis on the nationalization of monopolized branches of industry and trade, viewing monopolies as inimical to the public welfare. It also advocates state ownership of corporations in which the ownership function has passed from stockholders to managerial personnel. Smaller and less vital enterprises would be left under private ownership, and privately held cooperatives would be encouraged. The ultimate goal of all socialists, however, is a classless cooperative commonwealth in every nation of the world.
Norman Thomas, D. Litt, Robert E. Burke. Funk & Wagnalls ® New Encyclopedia. © 2006
World Almanac Education Group. A WRC Media Company.
http://www.history.com/encyclopedia.do?articleId=222614
Norman Thomas, D. Litt, Robert E. Burke. Funk & Wagnalls ® New Encyclopedia. © 2006
World Almanac Education Group. A WRC Media Company.
http://www.history.com/encyclopedia.do?articleId=222614
Epic Theatre
• Epic Theatre is the term used generally to describe Brecht’s theory and technique. His plays were 'epic' in that the dramatic action was episodic¬—a disconnected montage of scenes, non-representational staging, and the 'alienation effect'. All elements contribute to Brecht’s overall purpose which was to comment on the political, social and economic elements that affected the lives of his characters.
Summary of Brecht
• (Eugene) Bertolt (Friedrich) Brecht Biography was born Feb. 10, 1898, Augsburg, Ger.—died Aug. 14, 1956, East Berlin, in his life he was a poet, a playwright, and theatrical reformer whose epic theatre departed from the conventions of theatrical illusion and developed the drama as a social and ideological forum for leftist causes.
• Until 1924 Brecht lived in Bavaria, studied medicine (Munich, 1917–21), and served in an army hospital (1918). This period inspired his first play, Baal (produced 1923); his first success, Trommeln in der Nacht (Kleist Preis, 1922; Drums in the Night); the poems and songs collected as Die Hauspostille (1927; A Manual of Piety, 1966), his first professional production (Edward II, 1924); and his admiration for Wedekind, Rimbaud, Villon, and Kipling. During this period he also developed a violently antibourgeois attitude that reflected his generation's deep disappointment in the civilization that had come crashing down at the end of World War I.
• Among Brecht's friends were members of the Dadaist group, who aimed to destroy what they condemned as the false standards of bourgeois art. The man who taught him the elements of Marxism in the late 1920s was Karl Korsch, an eminent Marxist theoretician who had been a Communist member of the Reichstag but had been expelled from the German Communist Party in 1926. In 1928 Brecht and Kurt Weill, a famous composer, wrote the satirical, successful ballad opera Die Dreigroschenoper (1928; The Threepenny Opera) and the opera Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny (1930; Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny). In these years he developed his theory of “epic theatre” and an austere form of irregular verse. He also became a Marxist.
• In 1933 he went into exile—in Scandinavia (1933–41), mainly in Denmark, and then in the United States (1941–47), where he did some film work in Hollywood. In Germany his books were burned and his citizenship was withdrawn. He was cut off from the German theatre; but between 1937 and 1941 he wrote most of his great plays, his major theoretical essays and dialogues, and many of the poems collected as Svendborger Gedichte (1939). The plays of these years became famous in the author's own and other productions: notable among them are Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder (1941; Mother Courage and Her Children), Leben des Galilei (1943; The Life of Galileo); Der gute Mensch von Sezuan (1943; The Good Woman of Setzuan), Der Aufhaltsame Aufstieg des Arturo Ui (1957; The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui), Herr Puntila und sein Knecht Matti (1948; Herr Puntila and His Man Matti), and The Caucasian Chalk Circle.
• In 1949 Brecht went to Berlin to help stage Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder (with his wife, Helene Weigel, in the title part) at Reinhardt's old Deutsches Theater in the Soviet sector. This led to formation of the Brecht’s own company, the Berliner Ensemble, and to permanent return to Berlin. Henceforward the Ensemble and the staging of his own plays had first claim on Brecht's time. Often suspect in eastern Europe because of his unorthodox aesthetic theories and denigrated or boycotted in the West for his Communist opinions, he yet had a great triumph at the Paris Théâtre des Nations in 1955, and in the same year in Moscow he received a Stalin Peace Prize. He died of a heart attack in East Berlin the following year.
Copyright © 1994-2008 Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc.
http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9225028
• Until 1924 Brecht lived in Bavaria, studied medicine (Munich, 1917–21), and served in an army hospital (1918). This period inspired his first play, Baal (produced 1923); his first success, Trommeln in der Nacht (Kleist Preis, 1922; Drums in the Night); the poems and songs collected as Die Hauspostille (1927; A Manual of Piety, 1966), his first professional production (Edward II, 1924); and his admiration for Wedekind, Rimbaud, Villon, and Kipling. During this period he also developed a violently antibourgeois attitude that reflected his generation's deep disappointment in the civilization that had come crashing down at the end of World War I.
• Among Brecht's friends were members of the Dadaist group, who aimed to destroy what they condemned as the false standards of bourgeois art. The man who taught him the elements of Marxism in the late 1920s was Karl Korsch, an eminent Marxist theoretician who had been a Communist member of the Reichstag but had been expelled from the German Communist Party in 1926. In 1928 Brecht and Kurt Weill, a famous composer, wrote the satirical, successful ballad opera Die Dreigroschenoper (1928; The Threepenny Opera) and the opera Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny (1930; Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny). In these years he developed his theory of “epic theatre” and an austere form of irregular verse. He also became a Marxist.
• In 1933 he went into exile—in Scandinavia (1933–41), mainly in Denmark, and then in the United States (1941–47), where he did some film work in Hollywood. In Germany his books were burned and his citizenship was withdrawn. He was cut off from the German theatre; but between 1937 and 1941 he wrote most of his great plays, his major theoretical essays and dialogues, and many of the poems collected as Svendborger Gedichte (1939). The plays of these years became famous in the author's own and other productions: notable among them are Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder (1941; Mother Courage and Her Children), Leben des Galilei (1943; The Life of Galileo); Der gute Mensch von Sezuan (1943; The Good Woman of Setzuan), Der Aufhaltsame Aufstieg des Arturo Ui (1957; The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui), Herr Puntila und sein Knecht Matti (1948; Herr Puntila and His Man Matti), and The Caucasian Chalk Circle.
• In 1949 Brecht went to Berlin to help stage Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder (with his wife, Helene Weigel, in the title part) at Reinhardt's old Deutsches Theater in the Soviet sector. This led to formation of the Brecht’s own company, the Berliner Ensemble, and to permanent return to Berlin. Henceforward the Ensemble and the staging of his own plays had first claim on Brecht's time. Often suspect in eastern Europe because of his unorthodox aesthetic theories and denigrated or boycotted in the West for his Communist opinions, he yet had a great triumph at the Paris Théâtre des Nations in 1955, and in the same year in Moscow he received a Stalin Peace Prize. He died of a heart attack in East Berlin the following year.
Copyright © 1994-2008 Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc.
http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9225028
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Welcome!
Welcome to the dramaturgy blog for SDSU's Production of "The Good Person of Szechwan." This site is to help you learn all you want to learn about this production, the play itself and most importantly Bertolt Brecht himself, along with his beliefs, theories, and techniques. Ksusha Vanyan, Karli and I (Alicia-Marie) are looking forward to helping you along your journey and can't wait to see what you can create throughout this process.
Throughout the coming months, look forward to more in depth posts, links, and media to help you on your journey as well as information about what your designers are creating in the surrounding rooms of the Theatre Building.
Don't hesitate to let me know if you want to see something that isn't here or have found some great info yourself which you want to share.
Hope you enjoy and see you soon!
Alicia-Marie
Throughout the coming months, look forward to more in depth posts, links, and media to help you on your journey as well as information about what your designers are creating in the surrounding rooms of the Theatre Building.
Don't hesitate to let me know if you want to see something that isn't here or have found some great info yourself which you want to share.
Hope you enjoy and see you soon!
Alicia-Marie
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
