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).
