Peer Gynt was originally written as a prosepoem play in the late 1860s.Once published it received mixed to hostile reviews , never being performed for nearly a decade.Thereafter stagings have been few and far between , and the quality of productions has been similar.Some have wondered if the play could ever really be staged at all , whilst others have opined Radio airings are about the best limit to bring the play alive.
And so it was until a courageous and innovative production company from Dundee hit on the inspired notion of stage production , but adding their own words to make the play modern and accessible , whilst retaining the original themes.Too add a plethora of "FUCKINS" to spice up the prose of Ibsen would seem a bit of sacrilege , at least on the surface.Alas , the Dundee Rep. company approach worked , all credit to them for bringing a dead play to life.
The original play was to be accompanied by incidental music , music by Edvard Grieg which was in time to become far more famous than the play itself , so much so that a lot of People believe Griegs music came first and Ibsens version later.
The play itself has many universal themes , to that extent you could call this play as close as Ibsen came to straddle the line between The Romantics and the ushering in of the age of realism.After this play , as the wounding response of some critics , Ibsen was to focus wholly on prose , and realism in general.But , he was never to relinquish the over-arching Universal Romantic notion of a closed circle , unlike Chekov who was to start a brand of realism that begins and curtails ( rather than ever ends) in a more inter-active linear fashion.
The Dundee version plays strongly to the inner search of the Empire , Peer goes all around searching for it , only to realise he was looking for the wrong thing in the wrong places.
In the dream sequence in the troll kingdom , Peer finds society corrupt , Kierkegaards "to thyself be true" is made in the troll society of the time a rather Thatcherite " Be true to yourself-ish".
After winning his fortune in the great race , he loses it in the great grab his "friends" partake of , leaving him all alone on the shore , the sea on one side , a mirage on the other , and angry savages ready to pounce on the beach , a stint in a nuthouse is a welcoming solace , though a sobering as you may well guess.So much for Empire.
At last he goes home ( on easyjet) , eventually to discover the Empire that counts most is the constant love that waits for one , when one is true to their Faith ; Hope and a True Love.
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