Early in 1946, when I met Brecht, he was living in a spacious studio apartment in New York. I had to walk up several flights of stairs to reach the apartment which was on the top floor. Through the door, as I waited, I heard the squabble of pontifical radio voices. A short, wiry man in his shirtsleeves, with close-cropped hair, opened the door. Grinning broadly, he pointed to the radio and said: “That's the best theatre in America. Marvelous, the way they stutter around, go forward a little, go back then forward, then back some more.” Confused for a moment, I began slowly to make out that the radio voices were representatives of an UNRRA conference at the United Nations. Listening intensely, Brecht gesticulated and acted out with his body the invisible UNRRA delegates “stuttering” and “going forwards and backwards,” as he repeated with glee.