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The plays in this volume focus on the family and how it struggles to stay together by telling lies - and exposing them. In "Ghosts", Osvald Alving returns home only to discover the truth about the father he always looked up to, and learns the horrific effect his father's debauchery has had on him. It was Ibsen's most provocative drama, stripping away the surface of a middle-class family to expose layers of hypocrisy and immorality. "A Public Enemy" sets two brothers against each other when one wishes to make public the facts about the polluted water in the public baths of their home town. And "When We Dead Wake" tells of an artist meeting an old lover by chance and rejecting his wife, in a symbolic exploration of Ibsen's own literary life and the sacrifices he made in his work.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
Series: Penguin Classics
Paperback: 304 pages
Publisher: Penguin Classics; New Impression edition (June 30, 1964)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0140441352
ISBN-13: 978-0140441352
Product Dimensions: 5.1 x 0.7 x 7.8 inches
Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
Best Sellers Rank: #795,638 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #105 in Books > Literature & Fiction > History & Criticism > Regional & Cultural > European > Scandinavian #1884 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Dramas & Plays > Regional & Cultural > European #9743 in Books > Reference > Foreign Language Study & Reference
The best English translation I've read of "Public Enemy" aka "Enemy of the People". The other translations that I've read are by Le Galliene and by Meyer. I have not yet read the other two plays included.
Ghosts and Other Plays is a seminal series of plays that combine humor with scathing social critique. Ibsen was not afraid to tackle weightier themes and taboos, in order to shock his audience out of their complacency. These plays demonstrate Ibsen's loathing of hyprocrisy, soulless institutions, the mandates of society which cause suffering (ie. Christianity). He has also been perceived as the figurehead for the emancipation of women from their traditional "place." That is not to say Ibsen is of dire seriousness or dry. His plays move quickly, the events in "Ghosts" for ex. occurring in less than a day. Ibsen is a great playwright whose works remain relevant and vital, in a consumerist society where people still remain afraid to defy cultural norms.
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