Ghosts

About Henrik Ibsen

Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906) Norwegian poet and playwright was one of the shapers of modern theatre who tempered naturalism with an understanding of social responsibility and individual psychology. His earliest major plays Brand (1866) and Peer Gynt (1867) were large-scale verse dramas but with Pillars of the Community (1877) he began to explore contemporary issues. There followed A Doll's House (1879) Ghosts (1881) and An Enemy of the People (1882). A richer understanding of the complexity of human impulses marks such later works as The Wild Duck (1885) Rosmersholm (1886) Hedda Gabler (1890) and The Master Builder (1892) while the imminence of mortality overshadows his last great plays John Gabriel Borkman (1896) and When We Dead Awaken (1899). Frank McGuinness was born in Buncrana Co. Donegal and now lives in Dublin and lectures in English at University College Dublin. His plays include: The Factory Girls (Abbey Theatre Dublin 1982) Baglady (Abbey 1985) Observe the Sons of Ulster Marching Towards the Somme (Abbey 1985; Hampstead Theatre London 1986) Innocence (Gate Theatre Dublin 1986) Carthaginians (Abbey 1988; Hampstead 1989) Mary and Lizzie (RSC 1989) The Bread Man (Gate 1991) Someone Who'll Watch Over Me (Hampstead West End and Broadway 1992) The Bird Sanctuary (Abbey 1994) Mutabilitie (NT 1997) Dolly West's Kitchen (Abbey 1999; Old Vic 2000) Gates of Gold (Gate 2002) Speaking Like Magpies (Swan Stratford 2005) There Came a Gypsy Riding (Almeida London 2007) Greta Garbo Came to Donegal (Tricycle Theatre London 2010) The Match Box (Liverpool Playhouse Studio 2012) The Hanging Gardens (Abbey 2013) Donegal (Abbey 2016) The Visiting Hour (Gate 2021) and Dinner With Groucho (The Civic Belfast 2022). His widely performed versions include Ibsen's Rosmersholm (1987) Peer Gynt (1988) Hedda Gabler (1994) A Doll's House (1997) The Lady from the Sea (2008) and John Gabriel Borkman (2010); Chekhov's Three Sisters (1990) and Uncle Vanya (1995); Lorca's Yerma (1987); Brecht's The Threepenny Opera (1991) and The Caucasian Chalk Circle (1997); Sophocles' Electra (1998) and Oedipus (2008); Strindberg's Miss Julie (2000); Euripides' Hecuba (2004) and Helen (2009); Racine's Phaedra (2006); Tirso de Molina's Damned by Despair (2012); James Joyce's The Dead (2013); and Molière's Tartuffe (2023).