Playwriting and dialectical thought: Brecht's concept of dialectical materialist theatre, and the work of John Arden and Margaretta D'Arcy, Edward Bond and Steve Gooch

Abstract

This thesis examines the use of dialectic in the work of John Arden and Margaretta D'Arcy, Edward Bond and Steve Gooch and arguesfor the possibility of applying the philosophy of historical and dialectical , materialism and the concept of political contradiction to the construction of meaning in playwriting. Bertolt Brecht who initiated such a dramatic theory and practice is not used as a constant point of reference nor is my focus on a detailed comparison between him and the other writers. Having located his historical and dramatic limitations for present-day practice and after a critical and historical account of his reception in England, my concern is to examine how his idea of a theatre of dialectical and historical materialism was ignored, distorted, adopted and developed by these four playwrights. Conceiving theatre writing not as an innocent reflection of "objective" reality but as a conscious political and aesthetic practice capable of transforming the raw material found in life, my focus is on the ways by which this transformation takes place and on the ends it serves. To fulfill this function I examine the position that the relationship between the texts and the writers' ideological, aesthetic and political views occupies within the dominant ones. Within this context what runs through the thesis is a criticism of certain dominant ideas: that of humanism and idealism, the ideological implications of classic realism and the use of class and gender reductionism as the most recurrent drawbacks of a theatre practice which, instead of reproducing the established aesthetic, and ideological framework, aims to question it and suggest different possibilities. The criticism aims to locate the potential or the limitations of certain dramatic practices and political positions, develop them, or, when possible, suggest alternatives. On this basis the main issues I deal with concern popular and workingclass theatre, the use of character and caricature, history plays,propaganda and agitation, the representation of women, the position of the spectator and the relationships that define the theatre apparatus. As such the thesis is intended as an initial effort to build a theory for a dramatic practice concerning certain central issues that theatre workers confront when they want to use theatre as an agent of social change.