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Boom, Bust and Bertolt Brecht

By The World ⋅ September 15, 2009 ⋅ Post a comment
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bbpoemscoverIn the late 1920s, American capitalism inspired a German opera about a city built on greed … “Everything is defined by money. Everything can be bought, including human relations” … The opera’s creator decried capitalism. In the wake of the 1929 Wall Street Crash, Brecht wrote about New York. It’s as if he was writing last year. The World’s Alex Gallafent has the story.

Discussion

2 comments for “Boom, Bust and Bertolt Brecht”

  • Patrick Zwick

    What a terrible piece on Brecht. The juxtaposition with Obama’s speech is unconscionable. He was a Marxist and severe critic of Capitalism and America. You make it seem as if he escaped to America. Au contraire, he couldn’t wait to get back to Germany having failed to establish himself in Hollywood. After lying to the House Un-American Activities Committee that he was not a Communist (He joined the Party in 1930), he left America the next day, 10/31/47 and never returned. He was a problem for the Communist as well with his unwillingness to tow the part line with his very successful Berliner Ensemble theater company.
    Mahagonny, by the way is an imaginary city in Alaska not Alabama and why do you play Marilyn Mason’s cover of the Alabama Song rather than the much more famous and well known cover by the Doors.

  • Alex Gallafent

    Hi Patrick,

    Thanks so much for writing. I’m sorry you didn’t like my piece! There are a couple of things you mention that I’d dispute, however.

    Brecht did ‘escape to America’, albeit via a series of Scandinavian countries. While he did indeed return to what became East Germany in the last years of his life, he found wartime refuge in America. If anything, I take that fact to be a critique of Brecht’s thinking. He railed against capitalism yet the most capitalist of nations kept him safe.

    The juxtaposition of a comment about Brecht and a clip of the President was followed immediately by a line from me saying explicitly that “President Obama is not a Marxist”. The juxtaposition itself was intended to illuminate the similarity between the two, albeit from vastly different political and ideological positions. Brecht saw catastrophes as revolutionary moments that opened a door to the new – in his case the march towards a Marxist future. President Obama finds value in catastrophe too; as he says in the clip, he wants to turn “adversity into opportunity”, only in terms of a capitalist economy facing the 21st century. I don’t suggest an equivalence between Brecht and President Obama.

    The cartography of Brecht and Weill’s opera is not accurate (the hurricane moves from city to city in a way that’s hardly likely). But the city of Mahagonny is indeed in a fictionalised Alabama. Alaska certainly features, but it’s the place where the four lumberjacks come from (and at least one dreams of returning to.)

    Finally, regarding the version of Alabama Song – The Doors or Marilyn Manson – my answer is there in your question. The Doors version is infinitely better known; I had hoped it’d be fun to hear another!

    Thanks again for writing, and do keep the comments coming. I don’t expect you’ll agree with everything I’ve written; thanks for keeping me on my toes!