Margot Heinemann

It’s probably a good thing that we know so little about Shakespeare’s personal life. What biographical information we have concerns leases, wills, marriage lines, property. His pillow-talk with Anne Hathaway, Emilia Lanier or Mr W. H., interesting as it may have been, was not recorded. If you want to discuss Shakespeare, you have to depend on reading and seeing his work. Not so with Brecht. Not only did he write a great deal of commentary himself. All those who knew him well were impressed, and by now almost every one of them has written a book or articles about him, or at least had one ghost-written. New biographies and studies keep appearing, along with interviews and hitherto unpublished letters and diaries, and it’s easy to forget about the words on the page (or stage).

‘Sacrilege sanctifies.’ Under this heading Brecht cheerfully sums up what happens to plays, like Shakespeare’s, that outlast their own time – and what may now be happening to his own: