Overview

Bertolt Brecht's Me-ti, which remained unpublished i his own lifetime, now appears for the first time in English. For this work of fragments, Brecht accumulated anecdotes, poems, personal stories and assessments of Lenin, Hitler, Stalin, the Moscow trials, and the theories behind current events. Given its controversial nature, he sought a disguise, using the name of a Chinese contemporary of Socrates, known today as Mozi.

Me-ti is central to an understanding of Brecht's critical reflections on Marxist dialectics and his commitment to change, the philosphy of which informs much of his writing and his most famous plays, such as The Good Person of szechwan. Readers will find themselves both fascinated and beguiled by the reflections and wisdom it offers.

This edition features a substantial introduction to the concerns of the work, its genesis and context - both withing Brecht's own writing and withing the wide soical and political history, and provides an original selection and organization of texts. Extensive notes illuminate the work and provide commentary on related writing from Brecht's oeuvre.