Thursday 17 May 2018 saw the official release of Brecht: A Practical Handbook a new book by BA (Hons) Acting Programme Director David Zoob.
Described as a bold and exciting new approach to Bertolt Brecht, the book makes Brecht’s theories and ideas about theatre accessible to a new generation of actors, directors, students and theatre-makers, and showing how they can be put into practice.
With close analysis of texts by writers including Shakespeare, Chekhov, Miller, Pinter, and of course Brecht himself, Zoob has demonstrated how Brechtian techniques can provide practical pathways to exploring plays across the canon, as well as non-traditional forms of theatre.
Also included are dozens of exercises to help turn theory into practice, and explore what Brecht’s ideas mean for actors and directors, both in training and rehearsal.
The book, published by Nick Hern Books, is ideal whether for students, teachers, actors and theatre-makers alike, changing the way Brecht’s work is viewed and worked with.
David Barnett, Professor of Theatre, University of York, and author of Brecht in Practice says of the book;
‘Zoob has engaged with Brecht’s many and varied principles for a politicised theatre and channelled them into a wide range of novel and innovative exercises that are applicable to a great many dramas and can equally interrogate devised material… Excellent ’
Copies of Brecht: A Practical Handbook can be purchased online via Nick Hern Books.
David Zoob is Head of BA (Hons) Acting at Rose Bruford College. He has worked in theatre since the mid-1980s as a performer, deviser, director and teacher. He has been Associate Director at the Royal Theatre Northampton and at Theatre Clwyd. He is Artistic Director of Sacred and Profane, a company that creates new work integrating processed live sound with dramatic narrative, and he is an Associate Artist with Chaskis Theatre.