WHEN WE DEAD AWAKEN

By Henrik Ibsen.


Introduction and translation by William Archer.




INTRODUCTION.


From _Pillars of Society_ to _John Gabriel Borkman_, Ibsen’s plays had
followed each other at regular intervals of two years, save when his
indignation over the abuse heaped upon _Ghosts_ reduced to a single
year the interval between that play and _An Enemy of the People_.
_John Gabriel Borkman_ having appeared in 1896, its successor was
expected in 1898; but Christmas came and brought no rumour of a new
play. In a man now over seventy, this breach of a long-established
habit seemed ominous. The new National Theatre in Christiania was
opened in September of the following year; and when I then met Ibsen
(for the last time) he told me that he was actually at work on a new
play, which he thought of calling a "Dramatic Epilogue." "He wrote
_When We Dead Awaken_," says Dr. Elias, "with such labour and such
passionate agitation, so spasmodically and so feverishly, that those
around him were almost alarmed. He must get on with it, he must get
on! He seemed to hear the beating of dark pinions over his head. He
seemed to feel the grim Visitant, who had accompanied Alfred Allmers
on the mountain paths, already standing behind him with uplifted hand.