BRECHT’S SMOKESCREEN

So Bertolt Brecht’s works were written by his girlfriends (“Brecht & Company,” Aug. 14)? After the death of writer Theodore Dreiser, the author of “An American Tragedy,” “Sister Carrie,” and “The Cowperwood Trilogy,” critics similarly determined to erase Dreiser’s genius from the public mind said the same thing about his girlfriends. Not only were Dreiser and Brecht great writers but apparently they both had a singular genius for picking girlfriends who knew how to write brilliantly.

Was it a girlfriend who thought up Brecht’s remark about no smoking? Brecht had been questioned first by the Gestapo in his native Germany, then by the House Un-American Activities Committee in the United States. After the HUAC testimony he said: “At least the Nazis let me smoke.”

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DANIEL N. FOX, POMONA

I read Lee Wochner’s review of “Brecht & Company” by John Fuegi with growing disbelief. I find the notion that talented women wrote his material, etc. and kept silent about it preposterous. All because he was so great in bed! The book shows (as is said in the review) that Brecht conned everybody everywhere without exception. Come on! This hatchet job aided and lauded by Wochner is just plain unbelievable. Motivation? Political? Or to cater to the present fashion of bashing all things left? Great money making while the iron is hot.

MILDRED G. KRAMER, LOS ANGELES