|
To The Third Empire traces
the evolution of Ibsen's dramatic artistry and vision from
his earliest critical writings and youthful plays to the assured
mastery of Ibsen's great "middle period" when he produced
such major works as Love's Comedy, The Pretenders, Brand,
Peer Gynt, and Emperor and Galilean. To The
Third Empire therefor forms an aesthetic biography, in
which key themes sounded in the earlier plays are repeated,
immeasurably enriched, in the later works. We see Ibsen simultaneously
discovering his subject matter, his dramatic method and ultimately
his identity as a dramatic poet, first of Norway and then
of the modern world. This ranks among the most impressive
artistic odysseys: born in a provincial town in an obscure
cultural backwater of Europe, using a language spoken by few,
Ibsen was to become the writer of whom James Joyce was to
declare: "It may be questioned whether any man has held
so firm an empire over the thinking world in modern times."
Click
here to purchase through Barnes and Noble
Click here to purchase through
Amazon.com |
