Arthur Kutscher (17 July 1878 in

Hannover Hanover (; german: Hannover ; nds, Hannober) is the capital and largest city of the German States of Germany, state of Lower Saxony. Its 535,932 (2021) inhabitants make it the List of cities in Germany by population, 13th-largest city in Germa ...

– 29 August 1960 in

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...

) was a

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

historian of literature and researcher in

drama Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance: a play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on radio or television.Elam (1980, 98). Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has been ...

. Together with Max Herrmann he can be seen as a founding father of theatre studies in Germany. He was a professor at

Munich University The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (simply University of Munich or LMU; german: Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München) is a public research university in Munich, Germany. It is Germany's sixth-oldest university in continuous operatio ...

, where he taught a famous seminar in theatre history.Willett (1978, 43). Kutscher was a friend of the iconoclastic dramatist and

cabaret Cabaret is a form of theatrical entertainment featuring music, song, dance, recitation, or drama. The performance venue might be a pub, a casino, a hotel, a restaurant, or a nightclub with a stage for performances. The audience, often dining or d ...

-star

Frank Wedekind Benjamin Franklin Wedekind (July 24, 1864 – March 9, 1918) was a German playwright. His work, which often criticizes bourgeois attitudes (particularly towards sex), is considered to anticipate expressionism and was influential in the de ...

. His work influenced many playwrights, poets, and directors. His students included

Bertolt Brecht Eugen Berthold Friedrich Brecht (10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956), known professionally as Bertolt Brecht, was a German theatre practitioner, playwright, and poet. Coming of age during the Weimar Republic, he had his first successes as a pl ...

(studied in 1917),

Erwin Piscator Erwin Friedrich Maximilian Piscator (17 December 1893 – 30 March 1966) was a German theatre director and producer. Along with Bertolt Brecht, he was the foremost exponent of epic theatre, a form that emphasizes the socio-political content of ...

(studied in 1913),

Peter Hacks Peter Hacks (21 March 1928 – 28 August 2003) was a German playwright, author, and essayist. Hacks was born in Breslau (Wrocław), Lower Silesia. Displaced by World War II, Hacks settled in Munich in 1947, where he made acquaintance with T ...

Hanns Johst Hanns Johst (8 July 1890 – 23 November 1978) was a German poet and playwright, directly aligned with Nazi philosophy, as a member of the officially approved writers’ organisations in the Third Reich. The statement “When I hear the word cult ...

Klabund Alfred Henschke (4 November 1890 – 14 August 1928), better known by his pseudonym Klabund, was a German writer. Life Klabund, born Alfred Henschke in 1890 in Crossen, was the son of an apothecary. At the age of 16 he came down with tuberculo ...

, and

Erich Mühsam Erich Mühsam (6 April 1878 – 10 July 1934) was a German-Jewish antimilitarist anarchist essayist, poet and playwright. He emerged at the end of World War I as one of the leading agitators for a federated Bavarian Soviet Republic, for which ...

. Brecht's first full-length play, ''

Baal Baal (), or Baal,; phn, , baʿl; hbo, , baʿal, ). ( ''baʿal'') was a title and honorific meaning "owner", "lord" in the Northwest Semitic languages spoken in the Levant during Ancient Near East, antiquity. From its use among people, it cam ...

'' (written 1918), was written in response to an argument in one of Kutscher's drama seminars. While Kutscher was responsible for inspiring an admiration for Wedekind in the young Brecht, he was "bitterly critical" of Brecht's own early dramatic writings.Thomson (1994, 24) and Willet and Manheim (1970, vii).

Works

* ''Frank Wedekind, sein Leben und seine Werke. With plates, including portraits'' (Frank Wedekind, his Life and his Work), 192
Record on Amazon.co.uk
* ''Grundriss der Theaterwissenschaft'' (Compendium of Dramatics), 2 Vols., 1932-1937 * ''Stilkunde des deutschen Dichtung'' (Stylistics of German Fiction), 1949 * ''Der Theaterprofessor'' (The Theatre Professor), 1960 (autobiography)

References

Works cited

* Thomson, Peter. 1994. "Brecht's Lives". In ''The Cambridge Companion to Brecht''. Ed. Peter Thomson and Glendyr Sacks. Cambridge Companions to Literature Ser. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 22-39. . * Willett, John. 1967. ''The Theatre of Bertolt Brecht: A Study from Eight Aspects.'' Third rev. ed. London: Methuen, 1977. . * ---. 1978. ''The Theatre of Erwin Piscator: Half a Century of Politics in the Theatre''. London: Methuen. . * Willett, John and

Ralph Manheim Ralph Frederick Manheim (April 4, 1907 – September 26, 1992) was an American translator of German and French literature, as well as occasional works from Dutch, Polish and Hungarian. He was one of the most acclaimed translators of the 20th cent ...

. 1970. Introduction. In ''Collected Plays: One'' by Bertolt Brecht. Ed. John Willett and Ralph Manheim. Bertolt Brecht: Plays, Poetry and Prose Ser. London: Methuen. . p.vii-xvii.

External links

* 1878 births 1960 deaths 20th-century German historians German philologists German theatre critics Theatrologists Writers from Hanover Commanders Crosses of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany German male non-fiction writers {{theat-bio-stub