Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    When We Dead Awaken
    When We Dead Awaken
    When We Dead Awaken
    Ebook84 pages1 hour

    When We Dead Awaken

    By Henrik Ibsen

    5/5

    ()

    Switch to audiobook
    Read preview

    About this ebook

    "When We Dead Awaken" was Henrik Ibsen's final drama, which was first published in 1899. It is the story of a married couple, Arnold and Maia Rubek who while traveling find themselves romantically drawn to others, in the case of Maia it is Ulfheim, a brutal hunter, who is the object of her desire, for Arnold it is Irene, a beautiful woman from his past. In these desires the two find themselves questioning the choices that they have made in life and whether or not they have ever really lived at all. One of Ibsen's most despairing plays; in its tragic conclusion it is as if Ibsen is asking if the fulfillment of life's desires is ever really achievable.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDigireads.com Publishing
    Release dateJan 1, 2010
    ISBN9781596747166
    Author

    Henrik Ibsen

    Born in 1828, Henrik Ibsen was a Norwegian playwright and poet, often associated with the early Modernist movement in theatre. Determined to become a playwright from a young age, Ibsen began writing while working as an apprentice pharmacist to help support his family. Though his early plays were largely unsuccessful, Ibsen was able to take employment at a theatre where he worked as a writer, director, and producer. Ibsen’s first success came with Brand and Peter Gynt, and with later plays like A Doll’s House, Ghosts, and The Master Builder he became one of the most performed playwrights in the world, second only to William Shakespeare. Ibsen died in his home in Norway in 1906 at the age of 78.

    Read more from Henrik Ibsen

    Related to When We Dead Awaken

    Related ebooks

    Performing Arts For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Norwegian Wood

      Jul 25, 2019

      HENRIK IBSEN: THE MAN AND THE MASK By Ivo de Figueiredo, translated by Robert Ferguson. Yale University Press, New Haven, Conn., 2019. 704 pp., $40 cloth. HOW DO WE UNDERSTAND HENRIK IBSEN? Theatrically, he was the Master Builder himself, setting the

      7 min read

    • Article

      Saoirse Ronan

      Jun 4, 2016

      Saoirse Ronan
      5 min read

    • Article

      Polly Stenham

      Jun 4, 2016

      Polly Stenham
      1 min read

    • Article

      Michael R. Jackson What If

      Mar 25, 2019

      Michael R. Jackson What If
      6 min read

    • Article

      We Laughed–until We Cried

      Feb 5, 2020

      We Laughed–until We Cried
      4 min read

    • Article

      The Art of TheaterNo. 18

      Dec 1, 2020

      The Art of TheaterNo. 18
      39 min read

    • Article

      Mfa Or The Highway?

      Dec 25, 2019

      FOR YEARS, I IDENTIFIED AS A PLAY ‑ wright who wanted an MFA. I had seen those coveted three letters in almost every playwright’s bio, often attached to an illustrious university—an Ivy, or maybe a West Coast equivalent. I spent three autumns writing

      12 min read

    • Article

      Theatrical Seekers and True Believers

      Dec 25, 2019

      A MOMENT ON THE CLOCK OF THE WORLD Edited by Melanie Joseph and David Bruin. Haymarket Books, Chicago, 2019. 220 pp., $50 hardcover, $20 paper. MOMENT WORK: TECTONIC THEATER PROJECT’S PROCESS OF DEVISING THEATER Edited by Moisés Kaufman and Barbara P

      6 min read

    • Article

      Editor’s Note

      Jul 25, 2019

      IF THE FIERCE WOMAN IN A BROCADE JACKET ON OUR cover is unfamiliar to you, allow us to correct that. Playwright Adrienne Kennedy is an American original as distinctive as any artist who’s ever walked among us. Born in 1931, she began writing her lyri

      2 min read

    • Article

      The Poetry of Subversion: On ‘Shakespeare in Swahililand’

      Aug 25, 2017

      Shakespeare was often handmaid to the subjugation of people by English colonialists, who used the playwright as evidence of British superiority, while at the same time he was used by people across Africa in their own striving for national self-determ

      7 min read

    • Article

      10 Literary Diss Tracks

      Apr 9, 2018

      10 Literary Diss Tracks
      11 min read

    • Article

      Critic's Notebook: Star Turns That Serve The Broadway Play — Elaine May, Daniel Radcliffe And Janet McTeer Show How It's Done

      Nov 26, 2018

      NEW YORK - When it comes to playwriting, Broadway has a supply problem. Although the new generation of American dramatists is blazingly talented, the great majority of these writers prefer the creative flexibility of more intimate stages. New dramas

      6 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for When We Dead Awaken

    5/5

    1 rating0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      When We Dead Awaken - Henrik Ibsen

      WHEN WE DEAD AWAKEN

      BY HENRIK IBSEN

      TRANSLATED BY WILLIAM ARCHER

      A Digireads.com Book

      Digireads.com Publishing

      Print ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-3086-3

      Ebook ISBN 13: 978-1-59674-716-6

      This edition copyright © 2011

      Please visit www.digireads.com

      CONTENTS

      INTRODUCTION.

      DRAMATIS PERSONAE.

      ACT I.

      ACT II.

      ACT III.

      WHEN WE DEAD AWAKEN

      INTRODUCTION.

      From Pillars of Society to John Gabriel Borkman, Ibsen’s plays had followed each other at regular intervals of two years, save when his indignation over the abuse heaped upon Ghosts reduced to a single year the interval between that play and An Enemy of the People. John Gabriel Borkman having appeared in 1896, its successor was expected in 1898; but Christmas came and brought no rumour of a new play. In a man now over seventy, this breach of a long-established habit seemed ominous. The new National Theatre in Christiania was opened in September of the following year; and when I then met Ibsen (for the last time) he told me that he was actually at work on a new play, which he thought of calling a Dramatic Epilogue. "He wrote When We Dead Awaken, says Dr. Elias, with such labour and such passionate agitation, so spasmodically and so feverishly, that those around him were almost alarmed. He must get on with it, he must get on! He seemed to hear the beating of dark pinions over his head. He seemed to feel the grim Visitant, who had accompanied Alfred Allmers on the mountain paths, already standing behind him with uplifted hand. His relatives are firmly convinced that he knew quite clearly that this would be his last play, that he was to write no more. And soon the blow fell."

      The Literary Remains contain some preliminary jottings for When We Dead Awaken, and a rejected draft of the final scene. From the jottings it appears that the play was to have been called The Resurrection Day, and that Ibsen originally thought of introducing at least two characters whom he ultimately suppressed—the Physician at the Baths, a youngish, intelligent man, and the Tattling Lady from the capital who is considered immensely amusing by the patients, and is malicious out of thoughtlessness. At the end of a rough scenario of the first act there occurs the following curious reflection; In this country it is only the mountains which have any resonance [literally give and echo] not the people. In the draft of the last scene, Rubek, Irene, Ulfheim and Maia are all assembled outside Ulfheim's hut. The fragment begins thus:

      MAIA. (interrupting) Is it not strange that we four should meet here in the middle of the wild mountains?

      RUBEK. You with an eagle-shooter, and I with—(to IRENE)—with what shall I say?

      IRENE. With a shot eagle.

      MAIA. Shot?

      IRENE. Winged, madam.

      ULFHEIM unlocks the hut, and produces from it champagne and glasses, which he fills.

      ULFHEIM. (to MAIA) What shall we drink to, honoured lady?

      MAIA. Let us drink to freedom! (She empties her glass at one draught.)

      RUBEK. Yes, let us drink to freedom. (He drinks.)

      IRENE. And to the courage which dares to use it. (She takes a sip from her glass and pours the rest on the ground.)

      After ULFHEIM and MAIA have departed, RUBEK and IRENE have a last conversation which ends thus:—

      IRENE. The craving for life is dead in me. Now I have arisen, and I see that life lies a corpse. The whole of life lies on its bier—(The clouds droop slowly down in the form of a clammy mist). See how the shroud is drooping over us, too! But I will not die over again, Arnold!—Save me! Save me, if you can and if you will!

      RUBEK. Above the mists I see the mountain peak. It stands there glittering in the sunrise, We must climb to it—through the night mists, up into the light of morning.

      The mists droop closer and closer over the scene. RUBEK and IRENE descend into the mist-veil and are gradually lost to sight.

      The SISTER OF MERCY'S head, spying, comes in sight in a rift in the mist.

      High up above the sea of the mist, the peak shines in the morning sun.

      And that is the end.

      When We Dead Awaken was published very shortly before Christmas 1899. He had still a year of comparative health before him. We find him in March 1900, writing to Count Prozor: I cannot say yet whether or not I shall write another drama; but if I continue to retain the vigour of body and mind which I at present enjoy, I do not imagine that I shall be able to keep permanently away from the old battlefields. However, if I were to make my appearance again, it would be with new weapons and in new armour. Was he hinting at the desire, which he had long ago confessed to Professor Herford, that his last work should be a drama in verse? Whatever his dream, it was not to be realised. His last letter (defending his attitude of philosophic impartiality with regard to the South African war) is dated December 9, 1900. With the dawn of the new century, the curtain descended upon the mind of the great dramatic poet of the age which had passed away.

      When We Dead Awaken was acted during 1900 at most of the leading theatres in Scandinavia and Germany. In some German cities (notably in Frankfort on Main) it even attained a considerable number of representatives. I cannot learn, however, that it has anywhere held the stage. It was produced in London, by the State Society, at the Imperial Theatre, on January 25 and 26, 1903. Mr. G. S. Titheradge played Rubek, Miss Henrietta Watson Irene, Miss Mabel Hackney Maia, and Mr. Laurence Irving Ulfheim. In New York it was acted at the Knickerbocker Theatre, the part of Irene being taken

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1