The Gesture as a Way of Life.
Brecht’s Idea for a Transcultural Theatre
Brecht’s theatre work revolves around the idea of a transcultural theatre. It is highly topical in view of the currently rising manifestations of xenophobic hatred ‒ reactions to globalisation. Brecht had faced the experience of being a foreigner. Being able to understand daily routines and the familiar from a foreigner’s perspective are the aims and attitudes of the estrangement effect (Brecht’s Verfremdungseffekt or V-Effekt). It is not a mere theatrical technique, but a fundamental experience of being-in-the-world. Gesture, the protagonist in Brecht’s theatre, functions as a model for a transcultural way of life.
A special event of the Literaturforum im Brecht-Haus, in collaboration with the International Brecht Society (IBS) and the Bertolt Brecht Archive at the Akademie der Künste, Berlin