Eighteenth-Century Brechtians

Joel Schechter is Professor of Theatre Arts at San Francisco State University.  He is famous as a writer about clowns, jesters, satirists and their radical politics.  Much of his work has been focused on contemporary global mayhem. He was previously Professor of Dramatic Literature at Yale School of Drama, lecturer in Performance Studies at New York University and the New School for Social Research. He was Editor in Chief of the Yale journal Theater from 1977-92.

Eighteenth-Century Brechtians is an ambitious and engaging study that takes the reader on a time-travelling journey through the past, present and future of Brechtian theatre.Eighteenth-Century Brechtians is not only illuminating but engaging, and articulates one of Schechter’s central tenets: that theatrical activism is as necessary now as it was in the eras of Gay and Brecht, and that practitioners today could learn much from the radical subversives of the past.

• The Cast of Brechtians in Order of AppearanceList of IllustrationsForeword by Peter ThomsonIntroductionEighteenth-Century BrechtiansCross-Dressing Soldiers and Anti-Militarist RakesPolly Peachum and the New NaivetéPirates and Polly: A Lost Messingkauf DialogueThe Duchess of Queensberry Becomes Polly PeachumMacheath Our ContemporarySwift in Hollywood: Another Messingkauf DialogueSwift’s Polite Conversation with FalstaffHenry Fielding, Brechtian Before BrechtFielding’s London Merchant, and Lillo’sLiterarization of Fielding’s PlaysTom Thumb Jones, Child ActressA World on FireFielding’s Cibber Letters: Counterfeit Wit, Scurrility and CartelsBertolt Brecht Writes The Beggar’s Opera, Fielding Rewrites PollyStage MutineersCharlotte Charke’s Tit for Tat; or Comedy and Tragedy at War: A Lost Play Recovered?Mrs Charke Escapes HangingGarrick and Swift’s School for Scandal—With a Digression on Yoko OnoBrecht Praises Garrick’s HamletA Portrait of the Artists as Beggar’s Opera Disciples—Including David Garrick, Epic ActorWalpole in AmericaThe Future of Eighteenth-Century Brechtiana: Polly ExoneratedConclusion: The Future Promise of an Earlier AgeEighteenth-Century Brechtians: A Timetable of EventsBibliographyIndex