Henrik Ibsen Plays

This volume contains Ibsen's famous early epic, Peer Gynt, and the historical tragedy The Pretenders, which, together with Brand and Emperor and Galilean, form a magisterial quartet at the fulcrum of Ibsen's career. George Bernard Shaw praised Peer Gynt (1867) for the power of Ibsen's "grip on humanity ...The universality of Ibsen makes his plays come home to all nations." The Pretenders (1863), described by Kenneth Tynan as Ibsen's "first great play," was also his first real success in the theatre.
"Meyer's translations of Ibsen are a major fact in one's general sense of post-war drama. Their vital pace, their unforced insistence on the poetic center of Ibsen's genius, have beaten academic versions from the field."—George Steiner
"Crisp and cobweb-free, purged of verbal Victoriana."—Kenneth Tynan
Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906) is generally regarded as the father of modern theatre: "His influence on contemporaries and following generations, whether directly or indirectly ... can hardly be overestimated."—John Russell Taylor