Peter Weiss | |
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 Weiss speaking during the acceptance ceremony for the Bremen Literature Prize, 1982 | |
| Born | Peter Ulrich Weiss 8 November 1916 |
| Died | 10 May 1982 (aged 65) Stockholm, Sweden |
| Citizenship | Swedish |
| Alma mater | Polytechnic School of Photography; Academy of Fine Arts, Prague |
| Works | Marat/Sade; The Aesthetics of Resistance |
| Movement | Avant-garde |
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Peter Ulrich Weiss (8 November 1916 – 10 May 1982) was a German writer, painter, graphic artist, and experimental filmmaker of adopted Swedish nationality. He is particularly known for his plays Marat/Sade and The Investigation and his novel The Aesthetics of Resistance.
Peter Weiss earned his reputation in the post-war German literary world as the proponent of an avant-garde, meticulously descriptive writing, as an exponent of autobiographical prose, and also as a politically engaged dramatist. He gained international success with Marat/Sade, the American production of which was awarded a Tony Award and its subsequent film adaptation directed by Peter Brook. His "Auschwitz Oratorium," The Investigation, served to broaden the debates over the so-called "Aufarbeitung der Vergangenheit" (or formerly) "Vergangenheitsbewältigung" or "politics of history." Weiss's magnum opus was The Aesthetics of Resistance, called one of the "most important German-language work[s] of the 70s and 80s."[1] His early, surrealist-inspired work as a painter and experimental filmmaker remains less well known.
- ^ Klaus Beutin, Klaus Ehlert, Wolfgang Emmerich, Helmut Hoffacker, Bernd Lutz, Volker Meid, Ralf Schnell, Peter Stein und Inge Stephan: Deutsche Literaturgeschichte. Von den Anfängen bis zur Gegenwart. 5., überarbeitete Auflage. Stuttgart-Weimar: Metzler 1994, S. 595.