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  • Essay / Brecht and epic theater: the political undercurrents

    The German playwright, poet and theater director Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956) is perhaps best known as the pioneer and leading exponent of "epic theater " which, in opposition to epic theater The naturalistic or realistic drama or the drama of bourgeois tendency which once served an ambiguous cause by not explicitly bringing the main concerns of social constructs, Brecht often employs choruses and narration to highlight the artifice of theater and describe clearly and methodically for the audience. public both the characters' innermost thoughts through the use of the "alienation effect" by making them strange, and the major themes and lessons of the work itself, which in many ways , created the overall effect of alienation and contemplation through anti-sentimentality. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get the original essayBrecht began writing dramas in 1918, when he was just 20 years old. As he was part of the historical turmoil, he was heavily influenced by the violence and injustice of World War I and the chaos created by the devastation and catharsis of World War II which found place in his plays. His early works have strong anarchist overtones and reject both societal and artistic norms, as most mainstream art forms were not enough for him to accomplish the true cause, for which he was forced to flee Germany and was therefore forced to stay in Germany. exile. Brecht was a staunch defender of the school which promoted artistic creation for the good of life. He therefore tries to use the contributions of everyday life in his pieces and gives it a new color. In 1933, as the Nazis took control of Germany as a dictatorial power, Brecht, in complete opposition to Hitler's ideology and operations, struggled to survive. Without a choice, he left Germany and sought refuge in Denmark, Sweden, and Finland as he began to continue writing after settling in the United States. As a representative of the theater, in a state of banishment which was not then a normal thing for him, he produced some of his most famous works: “The Life of Galileo”, “Mother Courage and Her Children and “The Caucasian Chalk Circle”. were composed entirely abroad. Brecht's personality was not only frightening to the government of a defined country, but he went beyond territory by constantly raising questions against oppression and atrocities implicitly recorded. He was therefore once again suspected and designated as a suspicious individual during the “Red Scare”. During the early Cold War, because of his Marxist leanings and outspokenness about political perspectives and ideology, he was often aligned with the first generation of communist and anarchist outlaws, who fought to restore the rights of the working class. . He wrote for the cause of a certain group and a certain class, but with a certain scope of universality, this subtlety of expression without being highly critical of events, made Brecht an important figure. The proletariats were the main class Brecht targeted as an audience, as his plays proved to be a revelation to many. He used many elements to understand and question the implicit and hidden phenomena that operate without the consent of the working class. Thus, by using epic theater, Brecht attempts to bring a broader concern into the dialogues of his characters and integrates his ideato achieve this. The Caucasian Chalk Circle was written while Brecht was in exile during World War II. Having witnessed the violence, injustice, and destruction of two world wars in less than twenty years, Brecht placed the Caucasian Chalk Circle in a context of war, corruption, and political tumult. The idea of ​​epic theater originated in the early 20th century in Germany; it was a specific and spectacular development which, during the first quarter of the 20th century, flourished through the character of Brecht. Many of the concepts and ideas that Brecht incorporated into epic theater were already part of the theatrical practices of other cultures, but Brecht, by combining them, managed to form and popularize a new type of theater. Walter Benjamin, in his essay “What is Epic Theater,” explains what is mentioned in detail. His ideas and theories on theater were highly political in their effects, even if the idea of ​​"epic" rejects the naturalistic "system" put forward several years earlier by Konstantin Stanislavski. He attempted to persuade an audience to want to make a difference in society by stirring the emotions of the people he was targeting. In his early twenties, Brecht began to experience an aversion to capitalist society; he was raised and sought a more “egalitarian” approach to the world and the people around him. It was at this time that he began his exploration of Marxism: a political philosophy, often referred to as a form of socialism, which emphasizes the importance of class struggle in society and upholds the belief that everyone is equal. This is a view to which Brecht remained faithful throughout his life and career, with a certain level of Marxist influence noticeably present in each of his plays and productions. Marxists believe in a socialist society that does not discriminate between social classes. Marxists tend to be people from the working class or proletariat and these fellow Marxists, i.e. the proletariat, were the people to whom Brecht aimed his plays. The Caucasian Chalk Circle also attempts, in a sense, to drive home this idea of ​​class struggle by changing the ending of the play to giving Grusha the means to achieve justice. In the Chinese play that serves as the source text for Brecht's play, it is the child's biological mother who is unable to harm him during the chalk circle ordeal and who ultimately gains custody. Brecht's play, which features themes of class war and the corruption of the rich, ends with Azdak granting custody to Grusha, the servant whose goodness and selflessness overshadow the vanity and narcissism of the biological mother of the child. This selective approach by Brecht to empowering Grusha, who appears in this play as a representative of the "working class", is also an extension of the beliefs he holds with the idea of ​​"justice". However, by giving this play an alternative ending, he manages to balance Azdak's character through the predominance of justice and harmony at the end. He had to use his capacity within the performance center to interact with ordinary workers, in order to change the entrepreneurial abuses in which they lived. His plays rejected the naturalistic stage style and depicted the world of the time in a way that allowed each observer to receive "basic attention" to the activity they were seeing before an audience. Brecht established an arrangement of methods of execution and generation in order to create an air within the performance center that would prevent the group of spectators from "dragging their heads with their caps into the dressing room." In the text of Walter Benjamin “..