biography
| name: |
Ibsen, Henrik (Johan)
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1828–1906)
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| biography:
| Playwright and poet, born in Skien, S Norway. He worked at theatres in Bergen and Christiania (Oslo), and wrote several conventional dramas before his first major play, Kongsemnerne (1857, The Pretenders). His theatre having gone bankrupt, and angry at Norway's aloofness in the struggle of Denmark with Germany, he went into voluntary exile to Rome, Dresden, and Munich (1864–92). His international reputation began with Brand and Peer Gynt (1866–7). He regarded his historical drama, Kejser og Galilaeer (1873, Emperor and Galilean) as his masterpiece, but his fame rests more on the social plays which followed, notably Et Dukkehjem (1879, A Doll's House) and Gengangere (1881, Ghosts), which was controversially received. In his last phase he turned more to Symbolism, as in Vildanden (1884, The Wild Duck), Rosmersholm (1886), and Bygmester Solness (1892, trans The Master-Builder). The realism of Hedda Gabler (1890) was a solitary escape from Symbolism. He suffered a stroke in 1900 which ended his literary career. |
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