Brecht in Practice

David Barnett is Reader in Drama, Theatre and Performance at the University of Sussex, UK. He has published books on German theatre (studies on Heiner Müller and Rainer Werner Fassbinder), and is preparing a history of the Berliner Ensemble, the first book of its kind in any language. He has also published several essays and articles on German-, English-language, political and postdramatic theatre.

• AcknowledgementsOne: Revealing the Radical TheoristTwo: The Messingkauf as Performative Thinking Three: Brecht and DifferenceFour: Method Trumps MeansFive: Brecht and the ActorSix: Brecht and the DirectorSeven: Brecht, Documentation and the Art of Copying Eight: Brecht’s Method in Action: The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui and Closer by Patrick MarberEpilogueEndnotesIndex

The theater of Bertolt Brecht (1898–1956) has long suffered lamentable neglect in the US and the UK ... Fortunately, Barnett champions Brecht's cause with clarity and authority in this slim volume, which this reviewer predicts will soon prove indispensable to any serious Anglophone student of Brecht. ... The author draws on profound knowledge of the material, including Brecht’s drama, the crucial Messingkauf fragments, and the history of the Berliner Ensemble. At the heart of the book is the chapter 'Brecht and the Actor,' which elegantly dispatches the fallacy of a Brechtian 'style' and should be required reading in any acting class. Later chapters offer excellent illustrative readings of the application of Brecht’s principles to both Brechtian and non-Brechtian drama. Barnett has delivered a vital corrective to the misapprehension of Brecht’s theater. Summing Up: Essential. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty and professionals; general readers.