Ghosts (play)

A performance of Ghosts in Berlin, 1983.

Ghosts (original title: Gengangere) is a play by the Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. It was written in 1881 and first staged in 1882 in Chicago, Illinois, in a production by a Danish company on tour.^[1] Like many of Ibsen's plays, Ghosts is a scathing commentary on 19th-century morality. Because of its subject matter, which includes religion, venereal disease, incest and euthanasia,^[2] it immediately generated strong controversy and negative criticism. Since then the play has fared better, and is considered a “great play”^[3] that historically holds a position of “immense importance”.^[4]

Characters

• Mrs. Helene Alving, a widow
• Oswald Alving, her son, a painter
• Pastor Manders
• Jacob Engstrand, a carpenter
• Regina Engstrand, Mrs. Alving's maid and purported daughter of Jacob Engstrand; learns she is Captain Alving's natural child.
• Captain Alving, already deceased and never presented on stage; he is spoken of

Plot

Helene Alving is about to dedicate an orphanage she has built in the memory of her dead husband, Captain Alving. She reveals to Pastor Manders that she has kept hidden the negative aspects of her marriage, primarily due to the immoral and unfaithful behavior of her late husband. She has built the orphanage to deplete her husband's wealth so that their son, Oswald, might not inherit anything from him. Pastor Manders had previously advised her to return to her husband despite his philandering, and she followed his advice in the belief that her love for her husband would eventually reform him. But her husband continued his affairs until his death, and Mrs. Alving stayed with him to protect her son from the taint of scandal, and for fear of being shunned by the community.

During the action of the play, she discovers that her son Oswald (whom she had sent away to avoid his being corrupted by his father) is suffering from syphilis that he inherited from his father.^{[lower-alpha 1]} She also discovers that Oswald has fallen in love with Regina Engstrand, Mrs. Alving's maid, which is a serious problem because Regina is revealed to be an illegitimate daughter of Captain Alving, and therefore Oswald is falling in love with his half-sister.

When the sibling relationship is exposed, Regina leaves, and Oswald is in a state of despair and anguish. He asks his mother to help him die by an overdose of morphine in order to end his suffering from his disease, which could put him into a helpless vegetative state. She agrees, but only if it becomes necessary. The play concludes with Mrs. Alving having to confront this decision: whether or not to euthanize her son in accordance with his wishes.^[7]

Writing

Ibsen originally wrote the play in Danish, with the title, Gengangere. The Norwegian word is Gjengangere, which can be literally translated as "again walkers", or "ones who return," or "revenants".^[8] Norwegians also use this term for people who frequent the same places, whether pubs, parties, opening nights, or other occasions, so it has a different meaning and connotation than the English word "ghosts".

Ibsen wrote Ghosts during the autumn of 1881 and published it in December of the same year. As early as November 1880, when he was living in Rome, Ibsen was meditating on a new play to follow A Doll's House. When he went to Sorrento, in the summer of 1881, he was hard at work upon it. He finished it by the end of November 1881^[9] and published it in Copenhagen on 13 December. Its world stage première was on 20 May 1882 in Norwegian by a Danish company in Chicago, Illinois.^[10]

Performance history

Hedvig Winterhjelm as Mrs. Alving and August Lindberg as Osvald in the 1883 Swedish performance.

Ghosts premiered in May 1882 in the United States, when a Danish touring company produced it in Chicago, Illinois, at the Aurora Turner Hall.^[1] Ibsen disliked the English translator William Archer's use of the word "Ghosts" as the play's title, as the Norwegian Gengangere would be more accurately translated as "The Revenants",^[8] which literally means "The Ones who Return".

The play was first performed in Sweden at Helsingborg on 22 August 1883.^[9]

The play was produced independently in September 1889 at Berlin's Die Freie Bühne.^[11]

The play achieved a single private London performance on 13 March 1891 at the Royalty Theatre. The issue of Lord Chamberlain's Office censorship, because of the subject matter of illegitimate children and sexually transmitted disease, was avoided by the formation of a subscription-only Independent Theatre Society to produce the play. Its members included playwright George Bernard Shaw and authors Thomas Hardy and Henry James.^[12]

Ghosts was first produced in New York City on 5 January 1894. It was produced again in 1899 by the New York Independent Theatre with Mary Shaw as Mrs. Alving. Russian actress Alla Nazimova, with Paul Orleneff, gave a notable production of Ghosts in a small room on the Lower East Side. When Nazimova was a student in Russia, she wanted to “play Regina for my graduation piece at the dramatic school at Moscow, but they would not let me. Ghosts was at that time prohibited by the censor, because it reflects on the Church.”^[9]

The play received many European performances. In its 1906 production in Berlin, the Norwegian artist Edvard Munch was commissioned to create the original stage designs.^[13]

In May 4, 1962, the play was represented in México, in the Theatre Sala Chopin in Mexico City with the Mexican actress and Hollywood star Dolores del Río in the role of Mrs. Alving.^[14]

A Broadway revival of Ghosts ran from 30 August to 2 October 1982 at the Brooks Atkinson Theater in New York City, and starred Kevin Spacey as Oswald in his Broadway debut. The cast included Edward Binns, John Neville (who also directed the production) as Pastor Manders, Liv Ullmann as Mrs. Alving, and Jane Murray as Regina.^[15]

A touring UK production, designed by Simon Higlett and inspired by Edvard Munch's original stage designs for a 1906 staging in Berlin, began performances at Kingston's Rose Theatre in the United Kingdom on 19 September 2013, prior to an official opening on 25 September. Directed by Stephen Unwin, the cast included Patrick Drury as Pastor Manders, Florence Hall as Regina, Kelly Hunter as Mrs Alving, and Mark Quartley as Oswald.^[13]

An award-winning 2013–14 London production opened at the Almeida Theatre on 26 September 2013 and transferred to the West End at Trafalgar Studios on 9 December, running through 22 March 2014.^[16] Adapted and directed by Richard Eyre, it featured Lesley Manville, Jack Lowden, Will Keen, Charlene McKenna, and Brian McCardie. Manville and Lowden won Olivier Awards for their performances;^[17] Manville also won the Critics' Circle Theatre Award for Best Actress, and Lowden also won the Ian Charleson Award.^[18][19] Eyre won the Evening Standard Award for Best Director.^[20] The production also won the Olivier Award for Best Revival, and received Olivier Award nominations for Best Director and Best Lighting Design. A filmed February 2014 performance of the production screened in more than 275 UK and Irish cinemas on 26 June 2014.^[21][22][23] The entire filmed performance is viewable online.^[23][24] The production was also adapted for radio by director Richard Eyre, broadcast on BBC Radio 3 on 15 December 2013 and re-broadcast on 26 April 2015.^[25]

Original reception

Ibsen's contemporaries found the play shocking and indecent, and disliked its more than frank treatment of the forbidden topic of venereal disease. At the time, the mere mention of venereal disease was scandalous, and to show that a person who followed society's ideals of morality was at risk from her own husband was considered beyond the pale. According to Richard Eyre, "There was an outcry of indignation against the attack on religion, the defence of free love, the mention of incest and syphilis. Large piles of unsold copies were returned to the publisher, the booksellers embarrassed by their presence on the shelves."^[6]

Upon being produced in England in 1891, the play was reviled in the press. In a typical review at the time, The Daily Telegraph referred to it as "Ibsen's positively abominable play entitled Ghosts.... An open drain: a loathsome sore unbandaged; a dirty act done publicly.... Gross, almost putrid indecorum.... Literary carrion.... Crapulous stuff".^[26]

When Ghosts was produced in Norway it scandalised Norwegian society and Ibsen was strongly criticised. In 1898 when Ibsen was presented to King Oscar II of Sweden and Norway, at a dinner in Ibsen's honour, the King told Ibsen that Ghosts was not a good play. After a pause, Ibsen exploded, "Your Majesty, I had to write Ghosts!"^[6]

Notes

References

External links

• Ghosts at Project Gutenberg (translated by R. Farquharson Sharp)

• Ghosts at Project Gutenberg (translated by William Archer)
• Ghosts public domain audiobook at LibriVox
• Ghosts study guide, themes, quotes, teacher resources
• Ghosts, Award-winning 2013–14 London production, filmed and viewable online (rent or purchase)