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Born to Knud and Marichen Ibsen in a small Norwegian trading town, Skien.
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Ibsen's father was a respected merchant in the community of Skien, until in 1836 he was permanently disgraced because he went bankrupt. The family went to ruins, Ibsen's mother turned to somber religion which didn't help. Ibsen had to leave the misfortunes of his family as soon as he could. -
By age 15, Ibsen had left his hometown and family to move to Grimstad, where he supported himself as an apothecary's apprentice while using the nights to study for University. During this time, he also wrote his first play. -
Ibsen has an illegitimate son with maid Else Sophie Jensdatter Birkedalne, who is ten years older than him at the time. Ibsen goes on to pay child support to Else for over 15 years. Ibsen sees Hans Jacob once in 1892
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Ibsen moved to Christiania (Oslo) to study for entrance examinations and settle in as a student
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Catilina was the first play Ibsen had wrote, and it arose from the Latin texts that Ibsen studied for his university exams. -
At age 23, Ibsen got his first contraact at a new theatre at Bergen, where he was able to write a new play ever year.
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Ibsen explores the world and is exposed to plays of all forms, as well as seeing plays be Shakespeare for the first time while in Copenhagen and Dresden.
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One of his earliest plays written with Bergen's Norwegian Theater. It was inspired by the life of Inger, Lady of Austraat. -
One of his earliest plays, also considered Ibsen's "First publicly successful drama", with Bergen's Norwegian Theater. The play illustrates themes of love, loyalty, and betrayal in the setting of medival Norway. -
Ibsen is appointed artistic director at the Norwegian Theater of Christiana (Oslo), where he writes his first mature, modern, against the Victorian norms works. such as "Love's Comedy" and "The Pretenders"
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Ibsen describes Suzanne as "just the kind of character I need…illogical, but with a strong poetical intuition, a bigness of outlook, and an almost violent hatred of all things petty."
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Sigurd goes on to become aprominent diplomat and politician
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Love's Comedy was a satire on romantic illusions. It was violently unpopular and criticized but it expressed an authentic theme of anti-idealism that is unique to Ibsen -
"[Ibsen] dramatized the mysterious inner authority that makes a man a man, a king, or a great playwright. This one play was in fact the national drama after which Ibsen had been groping so long, and before long it would be recognized as such. But it came too late; though the play was good, the theatre in Christiania was bankrupt, and Ibsen’s career as a stage writer was apparently at an end." (Adams) -
Begins a twenty seven year long self-imposed exile in Italy and Germany, as he had to leave Norway in order to continue his works.
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A Doll's House first premieres in Stockholm, then Chirstiana and Bergen. The play begin a controversial success in all three cities, then it's premiere in London in 1884 spreading the message behind A Doll's House all throughout Europe. -
Ghosts opens for the first time in london, and is immediately critisized by the public. Describing it as "an open drain," "a loathsome sore unbandaged," and a "repulsive and degrading work."a -
The Master Builder premieres in Christiana (Oslo), considered one of the greatest drama's to date by Georg Brandes, a Danish critic at the time. Calling it "technically flawless, profound and precise in its symbolism…at the same time enthralling and liberating" -
When We Dead Awaken is Ibsen's final play, it explores themes such as existential despair, artistic ambition, and the search for meaning in life. -
During this time Ibsen suffers 2 strokes, the first leaving the right side of his body paralyzed and the second rendering him unable to walk.
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Ibsen's last words were 'tvertimod' "To the contrary," staying defiant to the end.