For at least two generations now the serious-minded European theatre has existed in an era of experimentation. The diverse experiments have not as yet produced any unequivocal, clearly discernible results, but the era is by no means at an end. It is my opinion that the experiments followed two separate courses, which, though they occasionally intersected, can, when separated, be individually pursued. These two courses of development are distinguished from one another by means of their individual functions: entertainment and instruction, that is to say, the theatre organized experiments which were to increase its powers of entertaining, and experiments which were to increase its powers of instruction.

In a world as fast-moving and dynamic as ours the enticements of entertainment are quick to wear out. We must always be prepared to meet the desire for progressive public stupefaction with new effects.

When anyone spoke of modern theatre a few years ago, he mentioned the Moscow, the New York or the Berlin theatre. He may also have spoken of a particular production of Jouvet's in Paris, of Cochran's in London, or the Habima performance of The Dybbuk, which, in fact, belonged to Russian theatre since it was directed by Vakhtangov; but by and large, there were only three capitals so far as modern theatre was concerned.

The Russian, the American and the German theatres were very different from one another, but they were alike in being modern, i.e., in introducing technical and artistic innovations. In a certain sense they even developed stylistic similarities, probably because technique is international (not only the technique directly required for the stage, but also that which exerts an influence on it, the film, for example) and because the cities in question were great progressive cities in great industrial countries.

In my attempts to arrive at a basic form for the musical theatre, I noticed several things which at first seemed to me to constitute entirely new insights but which after a closer look were revealed as but logical parts of the whole historical situation. While working on my own compositions, I constantly forced myself to answer the question: What occasions for music does the theatre offer? But as soon as I looked back at the operas written by myself and others, another question arose: What is the nature of music which is found in the theatre, and does such music have definite characteristics which label it music of the theatre? After all it has often been stated that a number of important composers have either never paid any attention to the stage or that they have tried in vain to conquer the stage.

My association with Brecht, taxing as any such association with a reflective person always is, has lasted now for half a year, and the attempt simply to avoid such association is oftentimes not a trifling one.

It is Brecht who always telephones or who, always friendly in his dry and somewhat restrained manner, inquires on the street if one has an evening free. Brecht seeks out conversation wherever he can find it. For my part, I gain the least from our conversations when Brecht thwarts them with his dialectic. One is defeated but not convinced.

On my way home at night, reflecting on his sarcastic comments, I often lose myself in an exasperated monologue: What he says just doesn't all agree! It is only when I hear his verbal discharges again from my own mouth, in the third person, spoken in a similar manner, just as frivolously, often even as spitefully, that I feel the need to cycle back again to Herrliberg.

The theatre of today has been significantly changed because of Brecht's influential work as a playwright, producer, and theoretician. In fact, anyone working in the theatre of today must come to grips with the phenomenon that is Bertolt Brecht. True, such an undertaking will be difficult. Brecht's achievements—literary, theoretical, and practical—are all parts of a whole which is not understandable if one part of it is examined by itself. Furthermore, as he wrote in his poem “Behauptung,” Brecht by no means “always remained the same“; both the man and his views changed. For this reason an investigation of the development of Brecht's theatrical theories apart from the rest of his work is a questionable undertaking. There are, however, two justifications for it: 1) So far nothing coherent about Brecht's early ideas concerning the theatre has been written.

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.