Two Concepts of Society in Drama: Bertolt Brecht's The Good Woman of Setzuan and Edward Bond's Lear

Abstract

Bertolt Brecht and Edward Bond, though of different generations, are two major representatives of a theater noted for its close relationship to modem society. Both playwrights are self-professed socialists and regard drama as a medium for expressing and communicating their political views. Brecht's Epic theatre is a rational form of theatre, aiming not at the emotional identification of a passive audience but at their critical awareness of what is happening on the stage and at their ability to transfer the fictitious reality of the play to the social reality of their everyday lives. Bond, too, conceives of his works as manifestations of a "rational theatre," confronting the spectators with analytical insights into modem society, and making them aware in which way they themselves are oppressed by and at the same time part of the alienating mechanisms of this society. For both playwrights, then, the theatre is closely linked with a pragmatic intention: it becomes a means critically to investigate and, it is hoped, to change the dehumanizing structures of modem society.