Brecht’s Epic Theatre as a Modern Avant-Garde

and Its Influence on Postmodern Theatre/Drama

Ribut Basuki
English Department, Faculty of Letters, Petra Christian University
Surabaya-Indonesia
Email: [email protected]

“It is safe to predict that Brecht’s work will become

increasingly important for us; not only because it is great,
but because it is exemplary as well.” (Roland Barthes0

Abstract: As one of the most influential figures in theatre, Bertolt

Brecht has stamped his legacy in the world theatre. His search for a
new kind of theatre made his theatre a modern avant-garde which
has left its traces in postmodern theatres. This paper tries to
investigate Brecht’s epic theatre as a modern avant-garde and its
influence in postmodern theatre. His epic theatre was in fact a revolt
against the main stream modern theatre in which Brecht openly
declares that theatre should be ‘political.’ Brecht’s theatre was so
influential that his theatre becomes reference to the postmodern
theatre.

Key words: epic theatre, Bertolt Brecht, avant-garde, postmodern,

propaganda

Bertolt Brecht was a modern man. He grew as a dramatist in a

world where modern ideas were at war, trying to prove which one was
the best. Liberalism was head to head with communism and capitalism
was facing the new born socialism. The war was complicated by
socialism’s variants, one of which was the fierce social nationalism
manifested in Hitler’s Nazism. During this period, as an artist Brecht was
fascinated by Marx’s ideas, which put him in the socialist front. Roland
Barthes even clearly calls him a Marxist (Worthen, 1993, p. 772).

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 Basuki, Brecht’s Epic Theatre as a Modern Avant-Garde 137

Brecht, however, although a Marxist and clearly anti-capitalist, did

not actually belong in either of the competing parties. In the rivalry of
classes between the capitalist bourgeoisie and the socialist proletariat, he
was in favor of the proletariat. Nevertheless, he was not actually “a
member of the proletariat fighting for the interest of his social class, but
rather a self-exiled member of the bourgeoisie” (Bremer, 1976, p. 1). In
his journal written when he was in exile in Denmark he wrote, “ I greatly
like the proletariat belief in its final victory. But the proletariat closely
connected belief in various other things it has been told, I find disturbing”
(Brecht,1993, p. 6). He had an antibourgeois attitude because of his deep
disappointment in his society’s civilization after World War I. He agreed
with Marx that it was the capitalist that created the ‘decadent’ society.
However, after World War II, although he shared the same basic Marxist
ideology with the communist party, he often had disagreements with
them. Brecht, says Willet, “was not the kind of figure who fitted all that
easy into any grouping” (Brecht, 1992, xi). As an artist, therefore, Brecht
did not serve any political “party.” His aesthetics was anti-Aristotelian
dramatic theatre, but it also “clashed with the (communist) aesthetics of
social realism” (Hubner, 1992, p. 139). He went to a different cutting
edge and developed his aesthetics with continuous experiments.
Brecht’s theatre--which is known as epic-theatre--, was clearly an
avant-garde. In fact it has been considered as one of the most important
and influential modern avant-garde theatres. His aesthetics has continued
to influence theatre until the present day, when the school of thought has
shifted from modernism to postmodernism. In this paper I shall examine
how Brecht’s epic theatre influences postmodern theatres. To do so, first
of all, I will review how Brecht’s epic theatre is considered a modern
avant-garde. Then, I shall examine the ideas in his epic theatre that
initiate the birth of postmodern theatres.

EPIC THEATRE AS A MODERN AVANT-GARDE

Brecht’s epic theatre developed in a political upheaval. Elin
Diamond noted that his theory was written over 30-year periode
(Worthen, 1993, p. 1284), ranging from pre- to post-World War II. To
understand it we need to review its historical background before
examining its theoretical foundation: the basic philosophy of epic theatre.

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Roland Barthes (in Worthen, 1993, p. 772) wrote, “to separate Brechtian
theatre from its theoretical foundation would be ... erroneous ....”
Examining its basic philosophy brings us to the understanding of Epic
theatre’s content. We will finally see how the content finally leads to the
development of its form.
Theatre was highly related to politics during Germany’s political
warfare. This close relationship is due to the fact that theatre is a very
effective media to gain influence. Theatre, according to Hubner (1992),
is distinguished from the other arts in that it is institutional and social in
nature (p. 5). “These characteristics closely ally to politics, since they
make it possible for theatre to be used as an instrument of propaganda”
(pp. 5-6). The socialists were really aware of this idea. In fact, they
“believed in the idea that theatre should serve society” (Gerould in
Hubner, 1992). Consequently, considering that the popular “bourgeois”
realism carried the ideas of capitalism, efforts were made by “the
revolutionaries” to battle such theatres.
Before Hitler came to power in 1933, there were at least two
dominant theatre ideologies in Germany that were against (western)
bourgeois realism: the social realism and the emerging cult (Nazi’s)
theatre. These two ideologies at first looked alike in that they worked for
the revolution. They all had influential theatre figures who made
“experiments” to develop a new kind of theatre. “The avant-garde artists
were denounced as ‘breeders’ of the proletarian world revolution”
(Zortman, 1984, p. 2). Brecht was supposedly one of them. However,
since 1927 Hitler’s National Socialist Party began to develop their own
kind of theatre, cult theatre, which was used to develop the idea of
Germany’s ‘pure’ and ‘genuine’ culture (Zortman, 1984, p. 1). This
party “intended not only to curb the tide of bourgeois cultural dominance
but (also) to annihilate it” (p. 16).
This cult theatre reached its peak when Nazi ruled the country.
“When Hitler came to power, the German theatre was flourishing, with
numerous wonderful buildings and high artistic level assured by a
nucleus of outstanding directors and actors” (Hubner, 1992, p. 90). This,
however, did not benefit Brecht and his friends since they were just empty
propaganda in which creativity had to submit itself to political purposes.
About this situation Zortman (1984) comments as follows:

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 Basuki, Brecht’s Epic Theatre as a Modern Avant-Garde 139

Fettered by their extreme ideology, the Nazi could never appreciate

that all artistic creativity spring from individual human inspiration,
… They could never apprehend that though he may criticize or even
ridicule his culture, he basically respects even reveres that culture, if
it is worthy, and thrives on his association with it by the bestowal of
his talents” (p. 7).
Aesthetically, Brecht suffered more since the Nazi “put a very
definite stop to the development of such (epic and didactic) theatre”
(Brecht in Worthen, 1993, p. 771). Brecht, being unable to work and
having a Jewish wife, chose to avoid Hitler by living in other countries
(starting from Denmark) where he continued to work on the epic theatre.
After World War II, in 1948, Brecht went back to Berlin (East
Germany). However, although living in a country with Marxist ideology,
he was not really welcome. Brecht’s epic theatre had to face the socialist
realism. “Brecht’s staging was accused of symbolism and naturalism at
one and the same time, or still worse of not fitting within the norms of
uniform socialist-realist art with its simplified didacticism and
idealization of reality” (Hubner, 1992, p. 139). This is because even
though Brecht had relatively the same ideology with the socialist-realist,
he had a different approach to Marxism.
Unlike the socialist-realist, although his theatre was also political in
nature, Brecht’s experiments with epic theatre were not primarily meant
to gain power. With some other Germany’s avant-garde artists, Brecht
started from the fact that “(early) in the nineteenth century theatre was
synonymous with the cheapest and artistically most dubious form of
entertainment. This state of affairs spurred into action socially conscious
individuals who decided that they must provide the masses with
artistically worthwhile theatre” (Hubner, 1992, p. 106). Brecht did want
to see his society change, but he was not involved in the proletariat’s
effort to rule the country.
To Hubner, Brecht’s theatre differed from socialist-realist theatre in
that Brecht’s was agitation theatre, while the socialist-realist’s was a
propaganda theatre. “Propaganda embellishes reality; agitation wants to
change it” (Hubner, 1992, p. 139). Hubner contends that Brecht’s
aesthetics got its root in 1920s under the distinct influence of Piscator and
agitational theatre (p. 139). Szanto (1978), however, sees it differently.

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He believes that all theatre is propagandistic (p. 72). “The play

propagandizes an ideology without an awareness on the part of the
playwright or of the production that the presentation is implicitly laden
with values which the play is propagandizing” (Szanto, 1978, p. 73). To
Szanto, even Aeschylus’s or Shakespeare’s plays contain propaganda!
Szanto categorizes theatre’s propaganda into three: agitation
propaganda, integration propaganda, and dialectical propaganda (p. 72).
Quoting Jaques Ellul he says, “(agitation propaganda) is most often
subversive propaganda and has stamp of opposition. It is led by a party
seeking to destroy the government or the established order” (p. 73).
Socialist-realism falls into the first category. Integration propaganda is “a
self-producing propaganda that seeks to obtain stable behavior, to adapt
the individual to his everyday life, to reshape his thoughts and behavior in
terms of permanent social setting” (Ellul in Szanto, 1978, p. 74). “Bour-
geois realism” belongs to this kind of propaganda.
Brecht’s theatre, of course, falls into Szanto’s third category. This
category, in his opinion, “is the most difficult theatre to create” (p. 75).
About this kind of theatre he further says:
It is a theatre which attempts to demystify, by depicting separately,
interactively and always clearly, the basic elements which comprise
a confused social or historical situation. This is the science of
dialectic materialism, …, brought to dramatic presentation” (p. 75).
Using Szanto’s view point we can finally see what Brecht’s theatre
is about. We can now trace epic theatre’s basic philosophy (content) and
its form.
Using Guba & Lincoln’s frame (in Denzin & Lincoln, 1994, pp.
105-117), we can say that as a Marxian theatre Brecht’s epic theatre
views reality as follows:
Ontology Historical realism—virtual reality shaped by social,
political, cultural, economic … value; crystallized over
time.
Epistemology knowledge (of reality) is value mediated and hence value
dependent.
Methodology dialectical

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 Basuki, Brecht’s Epic Theatre as a Modern Avant-Garde 141

‘Self’ in the epic theatre, therefore, is shaped by any dominant

social/political/ cultural/economic structures. No self is either natural or
independent. Unlike in classical plays—Greek plays especially--no
suffering is natural: it is always related to “structures that constrain and
exploit human kind” (Guba & Lincoln in Denzin & Lincoln, 1994, p.
113). ‘Self’ is value dependent, unlike in the realist’s belief in which
someone can choose his own identity. One needs, first of all, to liberate
himself/herself from the oppressing structure.
Changing/liberating ‘self’ requires more than just psychological
analysis. Brecht contends that there has to be “a transformation of
psychological ‘conflict’ into historical condition” (Worthen, 1993, p.
773) in theatre to liberate ‘self.’ To really understand the historical
condition and to realize that a person is formed by the dominant value
s/he has adopted unconsciously, a critical mind is needed. Therefore,
neither the actor nor the spectator should be drawn into “simple empathy”
(Brecht, 1992, p. 71), in which they usually try to identify themselves.
In his explanation about epic theatre, Brecht proposes that theatre
should provide a process of alienation: the alienation that is necessary to
all understanding (p. 71). Further, addressing the spectator Brecht gives a
comparison between dramatic theatre’s spectator and epic theatre’s
spectator as follows:
The dramatic theatre’s spectator says: Yes, I have felt like that
too—Just like me—It’s only natural—It’ll never change—The
suffering of this man appals me, because they are inescapable—
That’s great art; it all seems the most obvious thing in the world—I
weep when they weep, I laugh when they laugh.
The epic theatre’s spectator says: I’d never have thought it—that’s
not the way—That’s extraordinary, hardly believable—It’s got to
stop—The sufferings of this man appal me, because they are
unnecessary—That’s great art: nothing obvious in it—I laugh when
they weep, I weep when they laugh (p. 71).
To accommodate the contents, Brecht needed a new form.
“Shakespeare’s great plays, the basis of our drama, are no longer
effective” (Brecht, 1992, p. 20). He said further that those works were
followed by three centuries in which the individual developed into a

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capitalist, and what killed them was not capitalism’s consequences but
capitalism itself (p. 20). A new form, therefore, was to be developed; and
the birth of the epic theatre was inevitable. How is the form like? Brecht’s
table below gives a clear general explanation about the form of the epic
theatre:

DRAMATIC THEATRE EPIC THEATRE

plot narrative
implicates the spectator in a stage turns the spectator into an observer,
situation but
wears down his capacity for action arouses his capacity for action
provide his with sensation forces him to take decisions
experience picture of the world
the spectator is involved in he is made to face something
something
suggestion argument
instinctive feelings are preserved brought of the point of recognition
the spectator is in the thick of it, the spectator stands outside, studies
shares the experience
the human being is taken for the human being is the object of the
granted Inquiry
he is unalterable he is alterable and able to alter
eyes on the finish eyes on the course
one scene makes another each scene for itself
growth montage
linear development in curves
evolutionary determination jumps
man as a fixed point man as a process
thought determines being social being determines thought
feeling reason
(p. 37).

We can readily see that the table answers ontological, epis-

temological and methodological questions about epic theatre. The
contrast between “thought determines being” and “social being
determines thought,” for instance, is directly related to the ontological and
epistemological contrast between positivism and Marxist critical theory.

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 Basuki, Brecht’s Epic Theatre as a Modern Avant-Garde 143

The table also clearly lists the characteristics of epic theatre’s form.
Epic theatre uses narrative (not plot), episodic (not climactic) scenes,
montage (not dramatic development), curves (not linear development),
and scenes that jump (not cause and effect). These characteristics are
needed as methodological tools to achieve the desired purposes. Since
plot tends to draw the spectator into “the story,” Brecht introduces the
use of narratives, in which the spectator only becomes an observer.
Moreover, it is presented episodically with scenes that can jump to any
places or time without the spectator’s anticipation. This will make the
spectator “expelled” from “the story” anytime s/he is drawn into it. Even
more surprising, as a montage the scenes can be presented in a series of
non-linear scenes in which the spectator could not but think about what is
going on on stage.
The stage should also be set differently. Since the spectator is made
aware that s/he sees a theatre, not representation of life, Brecht argued
that “it is… necessary to drop the assumption that there is a forth wall
cutting the audience off from the stage and the consequent illusion that
the stage action is taking place in reality and without audience” (Brecht,
1992, p. 136). Curtain, therefore, is no longer useful. The spectator sees
the set directly as s/he enters the theater. “Theatre remains theatre” he
said (Worthen, 1993, p. 769), it’s not a ‘slice of life’ on stage.
There is also the need of having a different acting style. This is
needed to create “the alienation effect, … to make the spectator adopt an
attitude of inquiry and criticism in his approach to the incident” (Brecht,
1992, p. 136). On stage the actor presents a character, not represent
him/her. Brecht proposed, “The actor does not allow himself to become
completely transformed on the stage into the character he is portraying.
He is not Lear, Harpagon, Scheiwk; he shows them” (Brecht, 1992, p.
137).
Brecht wanted the spectator to think. Theatre is “an intellectual
process” (Boal in Birringer, 1991, p. 14) to Brecht. He didn’t want the
spectator to see life on stage, but to think about life. He wanted the
spectator to see how the theatre “demystifies relationships between
individuals and institutions, individuals and individuals, institutions and
institutions, so as to show first the nature of passion and economic and

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social laws, and second to demonstrate methods by which human beings

can control both themselves and their institutions” (Szanto, 1978, p. 76).

THE TRACES OF BRECHT IN POSTMODERN THEATRE

Going into the second half of the century, when politically the two
dominant ideologies (liberalism/capitalism and socialism/communism)
were engaged in a cold war; modern theatre, in terms of content and
form, started to stagger like an old human being. It is most clearly
depicted in Beckett: the last of the modernist (Szanto, 1978). Brecht, by
then, had been an accepted member of the main-stream modern theatres
and no longer considered an avant-garde. The form and content of epic
theatre was commonly “quoted” in new experiments. The modern
theatre’s experiments, however, showed “a kind of menopause of
modernism (which) cohabits with a series of techniques that depict
change as the basic order of existence” (Szanto, 1978, p. 162).
Commenting on Beckett’s works, Szanto further says that Beckett’s
works suggest the frightening implicitness that the late twentieth century
concept of art is in profound need of transformation (166). Now that
post-modern ideas have started to surface, a new take based on these
ideas in theatre has been inevitable.
The table below (see Basuki, 2000), although an oversimplification,
will help our understanding about the difference between modernism and
postmodernism that influences the theatre. It will also help frame our
tracing of postmodernism in Brecht’s epic theatre.
Modernism Post-modernism
grand design Local design
ultimate truth Relative truth
unity Diversity
uniformity Variety
objectivity Subjectivity

The list can go further, but now we can readily see that people have
been “tired” of modernist dreams of “general order” in the society. The
linear development in technology does not guarantee anything about a
better society. Humanity is devaluated until it equals to other factors in

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 Basuki, Brecht’s Epic Theatre as a Modern Avant-Garde 145

the production process such as natural recourses and technology, so that

“the society is decaying” (Fischer in Szanto, 1978, p. 176).
How does theatre react? Ernst Fisher says (in Szanto, 1978) that in
a decaying society, art, if it is truthful, must also reflect decay. He further
suggests that, unless it wants to break faith with social function, art must
show the world as changeable and help change it. With a set of
postmodern beliefs, however, fighting the dream of grand design with
another grand design, the old unity with a new unity, the old uniformity
with another uniformity, etc. is out of the picture since it is still the same
old modern way. To address the decaying society postmodernism does
not suggest another system as what modern socialism/communism did.
Instead, it “operates” in the existing society, trying to deal with human
problems more locally and personally.
In theatre we witness that the (postmodern) avant-garde has been
trying to do such efforts. We can see it, for example, in the works of
Kushner or Fornes although we can still see the presence of modernism in
such works. However, we can still justify it since an avant-garde does not
come out of the blue. We see that some of the “ingredients” are taken
from modernism. Moreover, some modern works have been far ahead of
their contemporaries since some artists have more far reaching vision
than the others. One of such artists is, of course, Bertolt Brecht. We shall,
therefore, now examine epic theatre’s contribution to post-modern
theatre.
First of all we need to examine it in terms of the contents. To argue
that post modernism carries a single content is against its characteristics.
Unlike epic theatre, postmodern theatre does not try to “oppose” (head to
head) anything. However, postmodern theatre also deals with social,
political, and cultural problems. In facing the dominant social and
political order, for example, some postmodern avant-garde try to
“empower” or “transform” the society that is immediate to it.. A good
example of such theatre is Augusto Boal’s “theatre of the oppressed.”
Boal, of course, owes a lot to Brecht. Even though he doesn’t want to be
called as Brecht’s postmodern successor (Jackson in Boal, 1992), his
work clearly uses a lot of Brechtian principles such as “social being
determines thought” or “argument instead of suggestion” that have long
been dealt with by Brecht.

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The biggest influence Brecht has made is, of course, in the aesthetic
form. Theatre has become an art form “that is both narrative and
nonlinear, both individual and collective—a theatre that avoids simple
naturalism and unheightened daily experience in order to present social
and individual reality on its stages” (Szanto, 1978, p. 165)—in
postmodernism. Some of the ideas behind it are clearly rooted in Brecht’s
ideas of episodic scenes in his effort to make the spectator think. For
example, we can see how big Tony Kushner’s Angels in America Part I:
Millenium Approaches owes to Brecht’s epic theatre. In fact, Brecht also
wrote plays specially written for bourgeois audience, one of wich is
Three Penny Opera (Szanto, 1978). Such plays have surely influenced
other writers even though they grow in the “bourgeois” realistic line.
Another influence Brecht has strongly made is in the actor-spectator
relationship. There has been postmodern plays that denies “the audience’s
passive emotional identification with the central character of conventional
realist or expressionist drama” (Birringer, 1991, p. 148) such as in Maria
Irene Fornes’ Fefu And Her Friends. Although Fornes develops it more
from the realist tradition, the idea of moving audience and letting them see
the play in different order (in act two)—which gives the idea that the
audience see a theatre (not life)--owes a lot to Brecht’s epic theatre. An
even further push on the involvement of the audience to “think” is done
by Augusto Boal. In his “forum theatre” Boal even encourages the
spectator to become spec-actor: they can go up the stage and replace the
actor’s role (Boal, 1992, pp. 17-36; 224-245).
Still another influence Brecht has made, however faint, is the
interdiciplinary form of the theatre. Brecht, we all know, used poetry,
songs, music, even dance in his epic theatre. He used them in a different
way from what dramatic opera did since in epic theatre the music, for
example, is not used just to heighten, proclaim, and illustrate the text but
to set forth the text: the music takes the text for granted and takes up its
own attitude (Brecht, 1992). More and more postmodern avant-garde use
such interdiciplinary form.
There are of course some characteristics of postmodern theatre that
have not been considered by Brecht; devaluing the text, for example.
Postmodern artists have come to the idea that a production has its own
text: a performance text. It does not simply mean a different interpretation

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 Basuki, Brecht’s Epic Theatre as a Modern Avant-Garde 147

of the text the way modern directors might think. It is a conscious

“political choice” to convey an idea to the audience. For example, a
director might cast a red-haired white man as the husband of a black
woman, and they have a blond son. With such a choice the performance
politically says “in theatre race doesn’t matter”. With such choices
theatre is “forcing on to the audience an ever greater awareness that the
event on stage is theatre and not natural occurrence” (Szanto, 1978, p.
172). The consequence of devaluating the text is that there might not be
any lasting plays in the future. Since the playwright is not “the initiator”
of the theatre performance, a play might only serve a single theatre
performance and then disappear. “As history moves toward such a
theatre, there may well be valuable dramatic experiences even if there are
no lasting plays” (172). It may be one of the directions of postmodern
theatre.
Brecht’s plays have now been in the cannon. After all, it is a modern
theatre, which is no longer avant-garde nowadays. With its strong
influence to the succeeding generation, however, his epic theatre is not
‘just another theatre’ in the cannon. It will continue to influence the
avant-garde,
“not only because it is great, but because it is exemplary as well.”
Roland Barthes.

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