Profile of Peter Weiss on Famous Like Me

Peter Weiss (November 8, 1916 - May 10, 1982) was a German writer, painter and artist. He was born in Neubabelsberg near Berlin and passed away in Stockholm, Sweden.

Weiss' most well known work is the play Marat/Sade (1963). It studies the power in society through two extreme and extremely different historical persons, Jean-Paul Marat, a brutal hero of the French Revolution, and the Marquis de Sade, for whom sadism was named. The play is considered a classic, and is still performed, although less regularly.

In Marat/Sade, Weiss uses a technique which, to quote from the play itself, speaking on the play within a play within itself (and no, that is not a confused statement): "Our play's chief aim has been to take to bits great propositions and their opposites, see how they work, and let them fight it out."

Weiss also wrote prose. His work consists of short and intense novels with Kafkaesque details and feelings, often with autobiographical background.

• FrÃ¥n ö till ö (1944) (German: Von Insel zu Insel)(From Island to Island)
• De besegrade (1948) (German: Die Besiegten) (The Defeated)
• Der Vogelfreie (1948) (published as Dokument I in Swedish (1949) and in German as Der Fremde (The Foreigner) under the pseudonym Sinclair (1980))
• Duellen (1951) (German: Das Duell)(The Duel)
• Der Schatten des Körpers des Kutschers (1952) (The Shadow of the Coachman's Body)
• Abschied von den Eltern (1960) (Leavetaking)
• Fluchtpunkt (1961) (Vanishing Point)
• Das Gespräch der drei Gehenden (1962) (The Conversation of the Three Walkers)
• Die Ästhetik des Widerstands (I-1975, II-1978, III-1981) (The Aesthetics of Resistance, Vol. I)

Weiss also directed some experimental films.

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