Brecht by Jan Needle and Peter Thomson (review)

Book Reviews 575 original play, itselfan ideological hodgepodge (A Man's a Man). Some twenty sketches and ideas for plays came to naught. In October 1926 Brecht began reading Marx and was very soon equating communismwith reason and capitalism with unreason (a conviction which induced him to create the cerebrally simple style of the didactic plays of the early thirties). From 1927 to 1929 there was a second dry spell, this time self-imposed, which enabled Brecht to make an intensive study of Marxian economics. (The Threepenny Opera was clearly a secondary effort.) Once he became thoroughly grounded in his subject, he was able to canate his many abortive endeavors and to weld them into one of his towering achievements: the first Epic play in the grand manner and the first (and probably last) play to make the complexities of Marx's Capital enjoyably comprehensible to a live audience: Saint Joan ofthe Stockyards. Lyon's study of Brecht in America is the story ofa man who made things considerably difficult for himself and others because he believed in his art and his communism. Both beliefs were interconnected and bound up with his creative achievements; yet a sense of Brecht's greatness is not conveyed to the reader. In this second way Pannalee's book becomes something special. As Willett emphasizes in his introduction, she lets us see why Brecht is worth fussing over. I cannot think ofa better way to close this review than to cite a paragraph from her study elucidating the fusion ofideology and aesthetics (and, by implication, America) in Brecht; it is just one of a number of compelling examples which demonstrate the author's knack for getting across the genius of the man: The interaction between art and politics - specifically between theater and education to communism - became the central theme of [Brecht's] thought for the thirty years he lived after reading Marx. In the first period of this preoccupation, he wrote in order to teach persons living under capitalism about the machinery of capitalism and methods of revolutionary discipline. In the second period, he wrote works against fascism. and political parables. And in the third, he wrote and directed plays to contribute to the development of communist consciousness in a socialist country. In all these phases (which are influenced by historica1 circumstances), Brecht believed the particular function that theater could have in the revolution was to teach. It could teach negatively - the nature of capitalism (and its distortion, fascism) - and positively revolutionary tactics. the nature of socialist and communist man, and the dialectic between individual and collective. The word teacher became for Brecht the highest praise. and the process of learning became the most fascinating human activity. (pp. 163f.) So what if Brecht never took a bath! It is, after all, the soldier Simon, one of the participants in the unforgettable love scenes of Chalk Circle adduced by Lyon, who has the most unflattering thing of all to say about Brecht's alter ego, the good-bad judge Azdak. friend of the downtrodden and teacher of the revolution: "A fart has no nose." RALPH J. LEY, RUTGERS UNIVERSITY JAN NEEDLE AND PETER THOMSON. Brecht. Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1981. Pp. xvi, 235, illustrated. $20. This new book on Brecht introduces itself in combative fashion. We learn that it is the product oflongstanding and productive disagreement between teacher (Peter Thomson) and pupil (Jan Needle), that it was completed in a "bolt-hole" in Belper, and that no attempt has been made to resolve at times conflicting views on a "magnificent and Book Reviews controversial dramatist." While the authors may be resolutely unapologetic about their approach, the reader who has picked his way through the mixture of lively, intelligent insight and imprecise generalization which characterizes their writing may feel less sanguine about the "inconsistencies and disparities of emphasis" on which Needle and Thomson pride themselves. One example of the careless judgements to which these lead is the comment that Arturo Vi and the Caucasian Chalk Circle contain "Brecht's finest and funniest court scenes." It is surely grotesque to link Brecht's grim parody of the Reichstag fire trial with Azdak's hilarious, anarchic wisdoms. Not...