Scandinavian C145A/245A: Henrik Ibsen, August Strindberg, and Late 19th-Century Scandinavian Drama

This literature course focuses on gender, sexuality, class, and crisis in the dramatic works of Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen (A Doll’s House, Ghosts, The Wild Duck, and Hedda Gabler, et al.) and his key rival, Sweden’s August Strindberg (The Father, Miss Julie, and A Dream Play, among others). The two most important European playwrights of their epoch in the 1880s and 1890s, both created their greatest plays in self-imposed exile on the Continent (Germany, Italy, France, and Switzerland). Lectures, secondary readings, discussions, short writings, and team presentations will all further investigate Ibsen and Strindberg’s pathbreaking artistry and influence within the transnational European cultural, political, and social contexts of their era and beyond. Course taught in English.