Henrik Ibsen

March 20, 1828 –
Let’s raise a toast of aquavit to the playwright Henrik Ibsen, born in Skien on this date. He was, at one point, 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 received much attention (owing largely to the fact that, while it was true that Norway did have a past, most of it was quite boring – none of it particularly glorious).

Overworked, underpaid, and very cold, he applied to the government for a stipend to study the fjords. The government decided instead to give him one to travel abroad, and off he went. He spent the next 27 years living in Italy and Germany, pining for those 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 truly Norwegian drama. At a time when most people were writing plays full of sword fights and murders, Ibsen began writing about relationships between ordinary people – the kind of people with terrible social diseases, suicidal tendencies, murderous intentions, incestuous thoughts, and the occasional old lech – the ordinary people of Norway

He used dialogue rather than monologues to reveal his characters’ emotions, and he abandoned verse. As he put it: “We are no longer living in the age of William Shakespeare… What I desire to depict are human beings, and therefore I will not let them speak the language of the gods.” (Though, of course, he said it in Norwegian.)

One of Ibsen’s first major plays was A Doll’s House (1879), about a woman named Nora who refuses to obey her husband and ultimately leaves him – famously slamming the door as she exits in the final scene. When it was first produced, European audiences were shocked, and it sparked debates about women’s rights, divorce, and domestic life across the continent. It also helped transform acting. At the time, actors were often praised for delivering long poetic speeches and avoiding collisions with the furniture, but Ibsen emphasized small gestures, vocal inflection, and meaningful pauses, inspiring a new generation of performers to truly embody their characters.

A Doll’s House made Ibsen a celebrity across Europe. His play Ghosts followed two years later. Its frank depiction of hereditary disease and moral hypocrisy further scandalized theater going audiences.

Henrik Ibsen once said, “You should never have your best trousers on when you go out to fight for freedom and truth.” (He may also have suggested avoiding them while mucking out the theater toilets—have you seen what actors eat?)

There is only one known picture in which Ibsen smiles. And yes, he was passing gas at the time.