The play was presented by student actors, and the performance was therefore less finished than it would have been under other circumstances. Aftenposten was doubtless right when it criticised the director for entrusting so great a play to unpractised hands, assuming that Shakespeare should be played at all. "For our part, we do not believe the time far distant when Shakespeare will cease to be a regular part of the repertoire."[III.8] To this statement a contributor in Aftenposten for Sept. 28 objected. He admits that Shakespeare wrote his plays for a stage different from our own, that the ease with which Elizabethan scenery was shifted gave his plays a form that makes them difficult to play today. Too often at a modern presentation we feel that we are seeing a succession of scenes rather than unified, organic drama. But, after all, the main thing is the substance—"the weighty content, and this will most certainly secure for them for a long time to come a place in the repertoire of the theater of the Germanic world. So long as we admit that in the delineation of character, in the presentation of noble figures, and in the mastery of dialogue, Shakespeare is unexcelled, so long we must admit that Shakespeare has a place on the modern stage."
Where did Aftenposten's reviewer get the idea that Shakespeare's plays are not adapted to the modern stage? Was it from Charles Lamb? At any rate, it is certain that he anticipated a movement that has led to many devices both in the English-speaking countries and in Germany to reproduce the stage conditions under which Shakespeare's plays were performed during his own life.
Of the next Shakespearean piece to be performed in Christiania, All's Well That Ends Well, there is but the briefest mention in the newspapers. We know that it was given in the curiously perverted arrangement by Sille Beyer and was presented twelve times from January 15, 1854 to May 23, 1869. On that day a new version based on Lembcke's translation was used, and in this form the play was given eight times the following seasons. Since January 24, 1882, it has not been performed in Norway.[III.9]
At the beginning of the next season, October 29, 1854, Much Ado About Nothing was introduced to Kristiania theater-goers under the title Blind Alarm. The translation was by Carl Borgaard, director of the theater. But here, too, contemporary documents leave us in the dark. There is merely a brief announcement in the newspapers. Blanc informs us that Jomfru Svendsen played Hero, and Wiehe, Benedict.[III.10]
After Blind Alarm Shakespeare disappears from the repertoire for nearly four years. A version of The Taming of the Shrew under the title Hun Maa Tæmmes was given on March 28, 1858, but with no great success. Most of the papers ignored it. Aftenbladet merely announced that it had been given.[III.11]
Viola, Sille Beyer's adaptation of Twelfth Night was presented at Christiania Theater on November 20, 1860, the eighth of Shakespeare's plays to be presented in Norway, and again not merely in a Danish text but in a version made for the Copenhagen Theater.
Neither the critics nor the public were exacting. The press hailed Viola as a tremendous relief from the frothy stuff with which theater-goers had been sickened for a season or two. "The theater finally justified its existence," says Morgenbladet,[III.12] "by a performance of one of Shakespeare's plays. Viola was beautifully done." The writer then explains in conventional fashion the meaning of the English title and goes on—"But since the celebration of Twelfth Night could interest only the English, the Germans have "bearbeidet" the play and centered the interest around Viola. We have adopted this version." He approves of Sille Beyer's cutting, though he admits that much is lost of the breadth and overwhelming romantic fulness that mark the original. But this he thinks is compensated for by greater intelligibility and the resulting dramatic effect. "Men hvad Stykket ved saadan Forandring, Beklippelse, og Udeladelse saaatsige taber af sin Fylde idet ikke alt det Leende, Sorgløse og Romantiske vandre saa ligeberettiget side om side igjennem Stykket, mens det Øvrige samler sig om Viola, det opveies ved den større Forstaaelighed for vort Publikum og denne mere afrundede sceniske Virkning, Stykket ved Bearbeidelsen har faaet." As the piece is arranged now, Viola and her brother are not on the stage at the same time until Act V. Both rôles may therefore be played by Jomfru Svendsen. The critic is captivated by her acting of the double rôle, and Jørgensen's Malvolio and Johannes Brun's Sir Andrew Aguecheek share with her the glory of a thoroughly successful performance.
Sille Beyer's Viola was given twelve times. From the thirteenth performance, January 21, 1890, Twelfth Night was given in a new form based on Lembcke's translation.
A thorough search through the newspaper files fails to reveal even a slight notice of The Merchant of Venice (Kjøbmanden i Venedig) played for the first time on Sept. 17, 1861. Rahbek's translation was used, and this continued to be the standard until 1874, when, beginning with the eighth performance, it was replaced by Lembcke's.
We come, then, to A Midsummer Night's Dream (Skjærsommernatsdrømmen) played in Oehlenschläger's translation under Bjørnson's direction on April 17, 1865. The play was given ten times from that date till May 27, 1866. In spite of this unusual run it appears to have been only moderately successful, and when Bjørnson dropped it in the spring of 1866, it was to disappear from the repertoire for thirty-seven years. On January 15, 1903, it was revived by Bjørnson's son, Bjørn Bjørnson. This time, however, it was called Midsommernatsdrömmen, and the acting version was based on Lembcke's translation. In this new shape it has been played twenty-seven times up to January, 1913.