These early impressions of the dramatist—the church tower, the pillory, the barred windows, the pale criminals—are of no little interest. They help to explain for us the sombre and tragic cast, purely human and reflective, of Ibsen’s character. They explain, too, the absence in his work of the sea and the forest, of those things which give such a sweet, wild aroma, now and again, to the work of Björnson and Lie. The little town, with its active commercial life and its equally active religious life—for Skien was a centre of pietistic influence—was such a place as is brought before us in “De Unges Forbund” and in “Samfundets Stötter,” and it was a fit birthplace for the author of “Brand.”
Knud Ibsen belonged to the aristocracy of Skien, and his house was a centre of its social life. When Henrik was eight years old there was an end of this, for his father became a bankrupt. After the catastrophe the family retired to a small and humble home outside Skien, where they lived with a frugality which was in marked contrast with their former life. There can be no doubt that this sudden change of circumstances, and the insight which it brought into the social cleavage of a provincial town, counted for much in Ibsen’s development. It is certain that at this period his marked individuality began to be perceived. He did not play like the other children; while they romped in the yard, he retired into a little inclosure in an alley that led to the kitchen, and barricaded himself against the heedless incursions of the younger members of the family. Here he kept guard, not only in summer, but in the depth of winter. It is clear that even at this early age Ibsen had reached the point of proud isolation and defiance of his fellow-citizens which Stockmann ultimately attained. One of his sisters describes how they used to throw stones and snowballs at his retreat to make him come out to join their play, but when he could no longer withstand the attack and yielded to the assailants, he could display no skill in any kind of sport, and soon retired again to his den. Reading appears to have been one of his chief occupations there, and Jaeger assures us that the words which many years afterwards Ibsen put into the mouth of the little girl Hedwig, who is so pathetic and tender a figure in one of his latest dramas, “Vildanden,” contain a reminiscence of childhood. “And do you read the books?” asked Gregers. “Oh, yes, when I can. But most of them are English, and I can’t read those. But then I can look at the pictures. There is one big black book, called Harryson’s ‘History of London;’ it must be a hundred years old, and that has such a number of pictures in it. First there is a picture of Death with an hourglass and a girl. I think that is hideous. But then there are all sorts of other pictures, with churches and castles and streets and great ships that sail on the sea.” He also amused himself with pencil and colour-box. Meanwhile he went to school, going through the usual course and learning a little Latin; he appears to have taken a special interest in the Biblical instruction. At fourteen he was confirmed, and the time came for him to make his way in the world.
At this period he wished to become a painter; he devoted himself with zeal to drawing, and an interest in painting has remained with him, the formation of an excellent little collection of Renaissance pictures becoming in later life one of his chief hobbies. In the existing state of the family means, this career was out of the question, and he was sent to an apothecary at Grimstad, a little town containing at that time not more than 800 inhabitants. The apothecary’s shop, Jaeger remarks, is the place where all the loungers meet in the evening to discuss the events of the day, and doubtless the apothecary’s shop was an element in the education of the future dramatist. In his interesting preface to the second edition of “Catilina” he has himself described the five years of development that he went through in this little town. He did not wish to become a chemist; he would become a student and study medicine. At the same time his poetical activity and the eventful year of 1848 came to arouse in the silent, solitary boy a healthy interest in the outside world.
It was while reading Sallust and Cicero for his matriculation examination that he conceived, and wrote at midnight, his first play, “Catilina.” With the help of two enthusiastic young friends the tragedy was published and some thirty copies sold—a result which did not permit of the proposed tour in the East on which the three friends had decided to expend the profits of the sale. Ibsen was now in his twenty-second year, and he came up to Christiania to carry on his studies at the school of Heltberg, who seems to have had a singularly stimulating influence on young men, and at the university. Here Ibsen was the comrade of Björnson, Jonas Lie, and others who have since become famous. At a later date Björnson condensed his youthful impression of his friend in two vigorous lines:
“Tense and lean, the colour of gypsum,
Behind a vast coal-black beard, Henrik Ibsen.”
The period now arrived at which Ibsen’s career was definitely settled. He had been making several unsuccessful literary attempts at Christiania, having finally abandoned the intention to study medicine, when, in 1851, the famous violinist, Ole Bull, who has done so much to give artistic shape and energy to the modern Norwegian spirit, gave him an appointment at the National Theatre which he had recently established at Bergen. Ibsen’s prentice hand was now trained by the writing of several dramas not included among his published works; and, like Shakespeare and Molière in somewhat similar circumstances, he here acquired his mastery of the technical demands of dramatic form. In 1855 his apprenticeship may be said to have ended, and he produced “Fru Inger til Östraat” (Dame Inger of Östraat), an historical prose drama of great energy and concentration. In 1858 he married Susanna Thoresen, the daughter of a Bergen clergyman, whose second wife, Magdalene Thoresen, is a well-known authoress. At the same period he was appointed artistic director of the Norwegian theatre at Christiania, a post previously occupied by Björnson, who had just inaugurated the Norwegian peasant novel by the publication of “Synnöve Solbakken.” In 1864, having acquired the means, Ibsen found it desirable to quit the somewhat provincial and uncongenial atmosphere of his native country, and has since lived in Rome, in Ischia, in Dresden, and at other places, but mainly at Munich, producing on an average a drama every two years. In 1885 he revisited Norway. Time had brought its revenges, and he was enthusiastically received everywhere. At Drontheim he made a remarkable speech to a club of working-men. “Mere democracy,” he said, “cannot solve the social question. An element of aristocracy must be introduced into our life. Of course I do not mean the aristocracy of birth or of the purse, or even the aristocracy of intellect. I mean the aristocracy of character, of will, of mind. That only can free us. From two groups will this aristocracy I hope for come to our people—from our women and our workmen. The revolution in the social condition, now preparing in Europe, is chiefly concerned with the future of the workers and the women. In this I place all my hopes and expectations; for this I will work all my life and with all my strength.” In private conversation, it is said, Ibsen describes himself as a Socialist, although he has not identified himself with any definite school of Socialism.
In personal appearance he is rather short, but impressive and very vigorous. He has a peculiarly broad and high forehead, with small, keen, blue-grey eyes “which seem to penetrate to the heart of things.” His firm and compressed mouth is characteristic of “the man of the iron will,” as he has been called by a fellow-countryman. Altogether it is a remarkable and significant face, clear-seeing and alert, with a decisive energy of will about it that none can fail to recognize. It is far indeed from the typical “pure, extravagant, yearning, questioning artist’s face.” In middle age it recalled, rather, the faces of some of our most distinguished surgeons; as is perhaps meet in the case of a writer who has used so skilful and daring a scalpel to cut to the core of social diseases. In society, although he likes talking to the common people, Ibsen is usually reserved and silent; or his conversation deals with the most ordinary topics; “he talks like a wholesale tradesman,” it has been said.
Ibsen’s dramas (excluding two or three which have not been published) may be conveniently divided into three groups, but the division is a rough one, for the groups merge one into another; Ibsen’s artistic development has been gradual and continuous.—1. Historical and Legendary Dramas, chiefly in Prose: The youthful “Catilina” (written in 1850, but revised at a later period), which stands by itself, and contains the germ of much of his later work; “Fru Inger til Östraat” (Dame Inger of Östraat), 1855, an effective melodramatic play of great technical skill; “Gildet paa Solhaug” (The Feast at Solhaug), an historical play of the fourteenth century, written in 1855, and reprinted in 1883, with a preface explaining its genesis; “Hærmændene paa Helgeland” (The Warriors at Helgeland), 1858, a noble version of the Volsunga-Saga, here brought down to more historical times, so as to present a vivid and human picture of the Viking period; “Kongs-emnerne” (The Pretenders), 1864, dealing with Norwegian history in the twelfth century; “Keiser og Galilæer” (Emperor and Galilean), finished in 1873, but begun many years earlier. 2. Dramatic Poems: “Kjærlighedens Komedie” (Love’s Comedy), 1862; “Brand,” 1866; “Peer Gynt,” 1867. 3. Social Dramas: “De Unges Forbund” (The Young Men’s League), 1869; “Samfundets Stötter” (The Pillars of Society), 1877; “Et Dukkehjem” (A Doll’s House), 1879; “Gengangere” (Ghosts), 1881; “En Folkefiende” (An Enemy of Society), 1882; “Vildanden” (The Wild Duck), 1884; “Rosmersholm,” 1886; “Fruen fra Havet” (The Lady from the Sea), 1888.
“Hærmændene paa Helgeland” is Ibsen’s first great drama; it has, indeed, been called the most perfect of his plays. The antique form and substance which he imposed upon himself compelled him to a severe self-restraint; the style also of the drama, which is in prose, is austerely simple and strong. Yet there is at the same time a curious and undisguised modern note about this work, and we feel throughout the presence of that spirit which gives life to Ibsen’s plays of to-day. The strong, passionate figure of Hjördis fills most of the field, however finely the lesser figures are moulded. She is the Brunhild of the ancient story, yet she is the same woman who is the heroine and the hero of all Ibsen’s social dramas; a strong and passionate woman, instinct with suppressed energy to which the natural outlets have been closed, and which is transformed into volcanic outbreaks of disaster. “A woman, a woman,” she says to Dagny, who is shocked at a remark about using the armour and weapons of a man, and mixing among men, “there is no one who knows what a woman can do.” Her father having been slain, she is brought as a young girl into the conqueror’s household. She finds a temporary satisfaction in the exercise of her physical strength. When the mild and honourable warrior Sigurd comes with his feeble friend Gunnar, both fall in love with her, and she, without speaking it, returns Sigurd’s love. She promises to give herself to him who can perform the greatest feat of strength, and Sigurd, by a ruse, wins her for his friend Gunnar, himself taking to wife the gentle Dagny. Henceforth there is something strange and incalculable in all the deeds of Hjördis, and a concentrated bitterness in her words. When afterwards she learns that Sigurd had once loved her, the proud and reserved woman offers in vain to put on helmet and breastplate and to follow him through the earth. “I have been homeless in the world from the day that you took another to wife. Ill was that deed of yours. All good gifts may a man give to his trothful friend,—all, but not the woman he holds dear. When he does that deed, he breaks the thread that the Norns have spun, and wastes two lives.” Hjördis is the woman of the social dramas, but it has not yet occurred to her that she has a life of her own.