The Dialectics of Galileo

Abstract

In the early fifties, Brecht wanted to change from “epic” theatre to “dialectical” theatre. The latter was to keep the “narrative element” of the former, but had a distinct aim: “ … deliberately to develop features —dialectical vestiges —from earlier forms of theatre and make them enjoyable” (Schriften zum Theatre, vol. 7, p. 316). “Developmental laws” were to be worked out by means of “the dialectic of the classical writers of socialism, so that we could perceive and enjoy the alterability of the world.” To this end, it would be necessary to make perceptible the “imperceptible contradictions” in all things, people, processes. Alienation techniques were to be used to depict the “contradictions and development of human co-existence,” and to make dialectic “a source of learning and enjoyment.”