A History of the Berliner Ensemble

Description

The Berliner Ensemble was founded by Bertolt Brecht and his wife Helene Weigel in 1949. The company soon gained international prominence, and its productions and philosophy influenced the work of theatre-makers around the world. David Barnett's book is the first study of the company in any language. Based on extensive archival research, it uncovers Brecht's working methods and those of the company's most important directors after his death. The book considers the boon and burden of Brecht's legacy, and provides new insights into battles waged behind the scenes for the preservation of the Brechtian tradition. The Berliner Ensemble was also the German Democratic Republic's most prestigious cultural export, attracting attention from the highest circles of government, and from the Stasi, before it privatised itself after German reunification in 1990. Barnett pieces together a complex history that sheds light on both the company's groundbreaking productions and their turbulent times.

David Barnett is Reader in Drama, Theatre and Performance at the University of Sussex. He is the author of Brecht in Practice: Theatre, Theory and Performance (2014), Rainer Werner Fassbinder and the German Theatre (Cambridge, 2005) and Literature versus Theatre: Textual Problems and Theatrical Realization in the Later Plays of Heiner Muller (1998). He has also edited the ninth volume of Brecht's collected plays in English, the Berliner Ensemble Adaptations (2014). He writes extensively on political and post-dramatic theatre in Europe and has published articles in Modern Drama and Contemporary Theatre Review on Brechtian and post-Brechtian theatre.

'Barnett's history of the company is a major achievement and a fascinating read.' Laura Bradley, University of Edinburgh 'Remarkably, Barnett's is the first history of the Berliner Ensemble to appear in any language. Written in English, this volume redressed that balance, reaching beyond Brecht scholars to theater practitioners and general audiences internationally.' Sam Williams, Das Brecht-Jahrbuch