Logos Theatre Company takes this gripping 19th century classic portrait of love, betrayal and hypocrisy to a London stage.
06/01/2006 :: As Mrs Alving prepares for the opening of a Memorial Orphanage for her late husband, her son Oswald returns from bohemian Paris with poor health. Haunted by family secrets, which could destroy her son's future, she must decide, whether to admit past sins or protect the family name at all costs.
'Ghosts' is a powerful social saga interwoven with comic irony that ends in shocking revelations, giving brutal insight into a dysfunctional family and the strength and destruction of a mother's self denial.
'Ghosts'
Tuesday 17 January - Saturday 4 February
The New Wimbledon Theatre
The Broadway
Wimbledon
London
SW19 1QG
Box Office: 0870 060 6646
About 'Ghosts'
A number of scattered notes on Ibsen's work on 'Ghosts' have been preserved. These are undated, but probably date from the winter and spring of 1881. Ibsen was living in Rome when the first connected draft of the play was started at the beginning of June 1881. On June 18th he wrote to his Danish publisher Frederik Hegel:
"One of the first days of this month I started to get down to the subject of a play that has occupied my thoughts for a long time, and now forced itself upon me to such an extent that I could no longer leave it alone. I hope to be able to send you the manuscript by the middle of October. I will let you know the title later; all I can do today is to call it «a family drama in three acts»."
The first draft has not been preserved, but was finished on September 23rd according to a letter Ibsen sent to Hegel at the end of September. Ibsen was in Sorrento at this point. Two days later he began the fair copy. This is extant, and as can be seen from the manuscript it contains so many corrections that Ibsen very likely wrote a second fair copy.
The fair copy of the first act was sent to Hegel on October 16th. The second act and the first page of the third act were posted on November 4th, while the last act must have been posted a week or two later.
On November 23rd Ibsen, suspecting what was to come, wrote to Hegel: "It is reasonable to suppose that 'Ghosts' will cause alarm in some circles; but so it must be. If it did not do so, it would not have been necessary to write it."