March 20, 1828 –
Let’s drink a toast of Aquavit to the playwright Henrik Ibsen, born in Skien, Norway on this date. He was a small time cherry herring bootlegger and an assistant stage manager for a new theater, where it was his job to produce a new drama each year based on Norway’s glorious past. He produced a number of plays, but none got any attention (owning much to the fact that while it was true that Norway did have a past – most of it was quite boring. None of it was glorious.) Overworked, under paid and very cold, he applied to the government for a stipend to study the fjords. The government decided to give him one to to travel abroad, and off he went. He spent the next 27 years living in Italy and Germany, pining for the fjords.
He found that by leaving his homeland, he could finally thaw out and see Norway clearly, and he began to work on creating a true Norwegian drama. At a time when most people were writing plays full of sword fights and murders, Ibsen started to write plays about relationships between ordinary people. The type of people that have terrible social diseases, suicidal tendencies, murderous intent in their heart, incestuous thoughts and old leches – the ordinary people of Norway.
He used dialogue rather than monologues to reveal his characters’ emotions, and he stopped writing in verse. He said, “We are no longer living in the age of Shakespeare. … What I desire to depict [are] human beings, and therefore I [will] not let them talk the language of the gods.” Except he said that in Norwegian.
One of Ibsen’s first important plays was A Doll’s House (1879), about a woman named Nora who refuses to obey her husband and eventually leaves him, walking out of the house and slamming the door in the final scene. When it was first produced, European audiences were shocked, and it sparked debate about women’s rights, divorce and home improvements across the continent. It also changed the style of acting. At the time, most actors were praised for their ability to deliver long poetic speeches and avoiding bumping into the furniture, but Ibsen emphasized small gestures, the inflection of certain words, and pauses, and he inspired a new generation of actors to begin embodying the characters they played.
A Doll’s House made Ibsen a celebrity across Europe. His play Ghosts (1881) came out two years later. It’s frank depiction of pottery making further scandalized the theatre going population.
Henrik Ibsen said, “You should never have your best trousers on when you go out to fight for freedom and truth. You should also never wear them when mucking out the toilets of the theatre. Have you seen what these actors eat?“
There is only one known picture in which Ibsen smiles. And yes, he was passing gas at the time.
Demand Euphoria!
The Haus of Dcaligari 