Brecht: Mother Courage and her Children

This is the first comprehensive study in English of Brecht’s Mother Courage in production. Peter Thomson provides a detailed account of Brecht’s own production in 1949 and then explores how the play has been transmitted–from Joan Littlewood’s production in 1956 to the Royal National Theatre in 1995. The book also examines interpretations by Judi Dench, Glenda Jackson, and Richard Schechner, among others. Seminal productions from the continent are also analyzed and a final chapter examines the play’s influence on among others, Peter Brook, and highlights the new urgency of the text in light of the wars in former Yugoslavia and Uganda.