Beyond Brecht
Britain's New Feminist Drama
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4550245 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Janelle Reinelt (corresponding author) |
| Year | 1986 |
| Volume | 38 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 154 |
| Publication date | 1986-05-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Theatre Journal (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0192-2882 • E-ISSN: 1086-332X |
| Publisher | JSTOR (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.2307/3208116 |
| OpenAlex | W2322495634 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 6 |
Bertolt Brecht's theory and practice have had a strong influence on the British theatre, dating from the first visit of the Berliner Ensemble in 1956 and the English publication in 1964 of John Willett's compilation of the theoretical writings, Brecht On Theatre. Political theatre practice in England had benefited from the socialist movement as well as the impact of the Beveridge Report on the arts. Following Beveridge's mandated university grants, educated working-class men and women had found their theatrical voices in playwrights such as Shelagh Delaney, John Osborne, and Arnold Wesker. The continuing search for a political form and technique led to Brecht who, in shaping a dramaturgy specifically suited to social critique, provided a path beyond social realism to the epic theatre. Brechtian techniques provided a methodology for embedding a materialist critique within the theatrical medium. Political theatre requires the ability to isolate and manifest certain ideas and relationships that make ideology visible, in contrast with the styles of realism and naturalism, wherein ideology is hidden or covert. Brecht's theorization of the social gest, epic structure, and alienation effect provides the means to reveal material relations as the basis of social reality, to foreground and examine ideologically-determined beliefs and unconscious habitual perceptions, and to make visible those signs inscribed on the body which distinguish social behavior in relation to class, gender, and history. For feminists, Brechtian techniques offer a way to examine the material conditions of gender behavior (how they are internalized, opposed, and changed) and their interaction with other socio-political factors such as class
Art · Drama · Literature · Sociology · Cultural Studies and Interdisciplinary Research · Diversity and Impact of Dance · Gender Studies · Theatre and Performance Studies
De quem é esse corpo? A performatividade do gênero feminino no teatro contemporâneo – cruzamentos entre processos criativos das mulheres, cena e gênero
Silenced Women in History a Feminist-Revisionist Study of Caryl Churchill’s Vinegar Tom (1976) & Sarah Daniels’ Byrthrite (1986)
A Cênica Feminista
The Feminist Scenics
Lessons from Brecht
A intuição feminista em Hysteria
| Unique citing works | 6 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,22 |
| Citation span | 1999 - 2024 (26) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 5 |