Ibsen, Henrik

New York. 0. Grosset and Dunlap. Grosset’s Universal Library Paperback Edition. Very Good in Wrappers. Introduction by Carl Van Doren. 432 pages. paperback. keywords: Literature Drama Norway Translated. FROM THE PUBLISHER - An Enemy of the People . The Wild Duck . Hedda Gabler . The Lady from the Sea. Each of these plays is a magnificent example of Ibsen, the master dramatist. They are powerful tales in which the characters are alive with a vivid realism that is as rare in the theater of today, as it was when it broke like a storm over Ibsen's audience. Over the years so much emphasis has been placed on Ibsen as a social commentator that Ibsen the storyteller has been woefully neglected. Yet his plays have certainly proved to be more than just vehicles for the challenging of 19th century social rigidity. Yesteryear's issues have perhaps lost much of their sensationalism or have long since been resolved. Yet Ibsen's plays still retain all of their urgency and importance, and continue as vibrant theater, rather than as relics of another era. Certainly nothing can diminish the complexities and ruthlessness of Hedda Gabler, or the desperation of Ellida's search for her illusive freedom in The Lady from the Sea, while The Wild Duck holds in it as much bitter irony today as it did in 1884. This is perhaps best expressed by Carl Van Doren in his Introduction to FOUR PLAYS OF IBSEN when he observes that Ibsen's ‘dramatic stories still have the vitality which lasts, in spite of time, in all truthful stories of realistic human beings.' inventory #41376