Henrik Ibsen

1. Henrik Ibsen Author of A Doll’s House

2. Ibsen • Creator of the modern, realistic prose drama • One of the first writers to make drama a vehicle for social comment • One of the only 19th century dramatists to explore topics that were considered socially unacceptable. • Ibsen is regarded as the greatest and most influential dramatist of the 19th century.

3. Ibsen • Born in Skein, Norway in the mid 1830’s • His father, a once successful merchant, went bankrupt • His family was forced to move to an isolated farm. • Ibsen, uncomfortable in new surroundings and stung by poverty and social rejection, became increasingly introverted. • At age 15, he became a druggist’s apprentice • Hating this work, he turned to writing poetry in his spare time.

4. Ibsen • Moved to city of Christiana (now Oslo) in 1850 and planned to attend the University. • After failing the entrance exam, he became determine to forge a life as a writer. • Having already written two plays, Ibsen was hired as a playwright by the city of Bergen, and remained there for six years.

5. Ibsen • Moved back to Christiania in 1857 to manage a new theater. • The theater went bankrupt in 1862, leaving Ibsen in a state of despair and deeply in debt. • Two years later, he left Norway for Italy and began a 27 year period of self-imposed exile during which he wrote most of his finest plays.

6. Ibsen • In the following years, his talent as a playwright continued to blossom. • A Doll’s House (1879) aroused controversy because it portrayed a woman whose actions were not considered acceptable at the time. • As the nineteenth century wound to a close, Ibsen continued to write prolifically.

7. Ibsen • In 1900, Ibsen suffered the first of a series of strokes that almost completely incapacitated him. • When Ibsen died in 1906, it was already clear that he had made a major impact on the theater. • However, the tremendous extent of his impact did not become apparent until later in the twentieth century, when it became obvious that Ibsen had completely altered the direction of the theater.

8. Ibsen – Critical Evaluation • Many later playwrights, including the great Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, were influenced by Ibsen. • Commenting on Ibsen’s impact on the theater, Shaw wrote," When Ibsen began to make plays, the art of the dramatist had shrunk into the art of contriving a situation. And it was held that the stranger the situation, the better the play. Ibsen saw that, on the contrary, the more familiar the situation, the more interesting the play.”

9. The Modern Realistic Prose Drama • Members of the first audience of A Doll’s House were stunned by what they saw. • Audiences were shaken by the rejection of existing social conventions. • Also surprised by the play’s graphic, realistic, and unflattering depiction of middle-class life. • Many found it disturbing • The audience unknowingly witnessed the birth of modern drama.

10. The Modern Realistic Prose Drama • Prior to Ibsen’s time, dramas were written predominantly in verse and did not depict events in an accurate manner. • Plays were meant to entertain by appealing to the imagination and by diverting attention away from everyday life. • Consequently, dramatists wove together intricate plots filled with coincidences that would be unlikely to occur in real life.

11. The Modern Realistic Prose Drama • Additionally, the language spoken by the characters rarely mirrored the way most people actually speak. • Characters often revealed their inner thoughts directly to the audience. • Finally, the sets used in dramatic productions tended to be quite simple with a single set used to represent a number of different places.

12. The Modern Realistic Drama • In contrast, Ibsen sought to depict life accurately by delving into the types of conflicts and dilemmas that he viewed to be characteristic of the time. • He focused on situations that could happen in real life. • He patterned his dialogue after real-life conversations. • His characters sometimes speak in incomplete sentences, express incomplete thoughts, change their train of thought in mid-sentence, and interrupt one another.

13. The Modern Realistic Drama • Ibsen revolutionized the way in which plays were staged by introducing elaborate, detailed sets that often changed from act to act. • In his stage directions, he offers a precise description of how the set should appear, as well as how the lighting should be used. • Not only does he use scenery, props, and lighting to contribute to the realistic quality of his plays. • He also frequently uses these elements as symbols. • Ibsen uses stage directions to instruct actors about how they should interpret certain lines of dialogue.