Experimenting with Law: Brecht on Copyright

Abstract

Can one reject copyright law and be a qualified observer of its dispositives? This question was taken up by Bertolt Brecht in an intriguing essay concerning the litigation surrounding the film adaptation of The Threepenny Opera (1928). Brecht here develops an experimental observation around the nature of film adaptation and cultural production in copyright. While an experimental approach to law was in itself a subversive gesture, the specific legal process enabled him to expose the paradoxical ways in which the copyright system worked.