Which aspects of Epic Theatre and Brecht's philosophy are found in scene one of 'Mother Courage and her children'?

Authors Avatar

Which aspects of Epic Theatre and Brecht’s philosophy are found in scene one of ‘Mother Courage and her children’?

Brecht reformed theatre, as he did not believe in following conventions.  He created ‘Epic Theatre’ as apposed to ‘Dramatic Theatre’.  Within this concept of Epic Theatre came many different techniques.  Brecht uses many of these in the first scene of ‘Mother Courage and her children’.

  The first of his methods evident in scene one is ‘Active Audience’.  As we have established ‘Mother Courage and her children’ is set during the time of a war.  We expect characters in the play to dread and despise war, especially those who took part in battles.  Brecht challenges our expectations and creates a Sergeant who is pro-war.

Join now!

  ‘Peace-that’s just a mess: takes a war to restore order’

This effectively stirs up an immense reaction within the audience only a short way into the play.  This is what Brecht had intended, he wanted this kind of reaction.

  Another of Brecht’s techniques used in scene one of the play is ‘montage’.  The scene is entire, it is almost like a short story with a beginning, middle and an end.  Also it is very informative as it reveals a lot about the main characters of the play, without going into too much detail.

  ‘Brecht uses ‘placards’ to ...

This is a preview of the whole essay