Bertolt Brecht, one of the most influential European playwrights of the twentieth century, was also a poet of distinction. Brecht's Poetry of Political Exile is the first comprehensive study devoted to his most important collection of political poetry, the Svendborg Poems. In these essays, a strong team of contributors take the poems as the focal point for a much wider study of politics and poetry under totalitarianism. They analyse Brecht's work critically and historically, discussing it in relation to questions of poetics, political commitment, exile, propaganda, rhetoric, and the scope and limitations of political poetry. Links are also drawn with the work of German, Soviet and English poets of the period, and with later German poets. This volume sheds light on Brecht's political investment in and aesthetic commitment to political poetry, and will complement the plentiful scholarship focusing on his drama.
