Feyerabend and Brecht

Paul Feyerabend met Bertolt Brecht and frequently refers to Brecht in writing. Feyerabend’s characterizing to his own writings as “collage” parallels Brecht’s description of his own work as “montage,” both forms of art and film respectively. Feyerabend’s called himself a Dadaist referring to a post-WWI movement to which Brecht was originally sympathetic. Both Feyerabend and Brecht believed there was an ultimate unity of science and art. The two men also each had sympathy for Chinese culture, both ancient and Maoist. Feyerabend’s criticisms of the scientific methodology advocated by Imre Lakatos parallel Brecht’s criticisms of Georg Lukács in the “expressionism debate” in aesthetics.