| Title | : | Henrik Ibsen and the Birth of Modernism: Art, Theater, Philosophy |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0199295875 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780199295876 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Hardcover |
| Number of Pages | : | 416 |
| Publication | : | First published August 3, 2006 |
| Awards | : | Aldo and Jeanne Scaglione Prize for Comparative Literary Studies (2006) |
modern theater. In Henrik Ibsen and the Birth of Modernism , Toril Moi makes a powerful case not just for Ibsen's modernity, but also for his modernism.
Henrik Ibsen and the Birth of Modernism situates Ibsen in his cultural context, emphasizes his position as a Norwegian in European culture, and shows how important painting and other visual arts were for his aesthetic education. The book rewrites literary history, reminding modern readers that
idealism was the dominant aesthetic paradigm of the nineteenth century. Modernism was born in the ruins of idealism, Moi argues, thus challenging traditional theories of the opposition between realism and modernism.
By reading Ibsen's modernist plays as investigations of the fate of love in an age of skepticism, Moi shows why Ibsen still matters to us. In this book, Ibsen's plays are showed to be profoundly concerned by theater and theatricality, both on stage and in everyday life. Ibsen's unsettling
explorations of women, men and marriage here emerge as chronicles of the tension between skepticism and the everyday, and between critique and utopia in modernity.
This radical new account places Ibsen in his rightful place alongside Baudelaire, Flaubert and Manet as a founder of European modernism.
Henrik Ibsen and the Birth of Modernism: Art, Theater, Philosophy Reviews
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Just staggering, I thought: a definitive account of Ibsen's plays, an entree into an entire world of nineteenth-century Norwegian intellectual history, and a fascinating discussion of some aspects of theater and theatricality in general. (Who knew Ibsen was profoundly influenced by Victorian narrative art?) I can't recommend this highly enough, either for the study of other theater or for assigning (in parts) to students reading Ibsen. What higher praise can one offer than "this book made me want to read minor Ibsen"?
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I found Chapter 7, which discusses "A Doll's House" very helpful to my overall understanding of the impact the play would have had on its contemporary viewer. Moi's discussion of Nora as the human being versus doll (automaton) is going to be very helpful when unpacking this play with my AP Lit students.
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Pretty good book. Too bad I'm allergic to her class.
