When We Dead Awaken - Softcover

Ibsen, Henrik

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0948230274 ISBN 13: 9780948230271

Publisher: Oberon Books, 1991

Synopsis

When We Dead Awaken (Norwegian: Når vi døde vågner) is the last play written by Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen. Published in December 1899, Ibsen wrote the play between February and November of that year. The first performance was at the Haymarket Theatre in London, a day or two before publication. The play is dominated by images of stone and petrification. The play charts a progression up into the mountains, and Rubek is a sculptor. One of Ibsen's most dreamlike plays, When We Dead Awaken is also one of his most despairing. "When we dead awaken," Irene explains, "we find that we have never lived." The play is suffused by an intense desire for life, but whether it can be achieved is left problematic, given the play's ironic conclusion (which is, incidentally, reminiscent of the first of Ibsen's two major verse dramas, Brand, and one of his last works in prose, The Master Builder). Some authors argue that the dark romance in the play is based on Auguste Rodin's relationship with Camille Claudel.

About this title

About the Author

Henrik Johan Ibsen (20 March 1828 - 23 May 1906) was a major 19th-century Norwegian playwright, theatre director, and poet. He is often referred to as "the father of realism" and is one of the founders of Modernism in theatre. His major works include Brand, Peer Gynt, An Enemy of the People, Emperor and Galilean, A Doll's House, Hedda Gabler, Ghosts, The Wild Duck, Rosmersholm, and The Master Builder. He is the most frequently performed dramatist in the world after Shakespeare, and A Doll's House became the world's most performed play by the early 20th century. Several of his plays were considered scandalous to many of his era, when European theatre was required to model strict morals of family life and propriety. Ibsen's work examined the realities that lay behind many facades, revealing much that was disquieting to many contemporaries. It utilized a critical eye and free inquiry into the conditions of life and issues of morality. The poetic and cinematic play Peer Gynt, however, has strong surreal elements."

Edition details

• Publisher: Oberon Books
• Publication date: 1991
• ISBN 10: 0948230274
• ISBN 13: 9780948230271
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 174