Bertolt Brecht’s Legacy: Enhancing Understanding, Stimulating Debate and Influencing Creative Practice

Narrative

Stephen Parker’s research generated a fresh interpretation of Bertolt Brecht’s life and work, founded upon a new understanding of Brecht’s idiosyncratic artistic sensibility. The research supplanted his categorisation as a ‘socialist classic’ and provided a novel reading of the works. The research findings, published in Parker’s acclaimed biography Bertolt Brecht: A Literary Life (2014), its translations and related publications, have enhanced understanding, stimulated debate and informed new creative outputs centred on one of the twentieth century’s most iconic and significant European writers, as a dramatist, director, cultural theorist and poet. The reach and significance of the impact is evidenced through: (1) the biography’s commercial, critical and public acclaim; and (2) the influence of the biography and related research on creative practice, including artistic interpretation and performance.

Impact date	2014 → 2020
Category of impact	Awareness and understanding, Society and culture