Summer Reading and short course at UCB: Swedish Professor, Ulf Olsson on Strindberg
I am taking a very short course, "Wonderful and Bizarre: The works of August Strindberg. Having seen "Miss Julie" on the stage and in the film version and having read it, several times in the past, along with the drama "The Dance of Death" which has inspired music, plays and films, and also, "the Father". I had not read "The Ghost Sonatas" which were featured in this course, along with two essays and one article, all by Strindberg.
Having visited Strindberg's last apartment in Stockholm, when I visited Sweden for one month, one lovely June, giving a paper on the comparative study of Emily Dickinson's poems set to music by the composers Aaron Copeland and John Adams, in Lund university, for an international interarts conference that was fascinating---- I was happy to have a chance to learn more, from a professor who has written a book on Strindberg, and is based at the University in Stockholm.
Strindberg is not as familiar to me, as Heinrick Ibsen, about whom I wrote the paper, which is published now in 2012, in an anthology of about 100/300 papers gathered together, for that conference. It was presented at the International Ibsen Society meeting in Fudan University in Shanghai, China and focused on my specialty, interarts relations. In this case, the composer Grieg, and the artist, Munch, and then the architectonics(architecture metaphor) of "The Master Builder". This paper was fascinating to research, and the materials on houses and churches and buildings in Norway were provided to me by the Norweigan Consul in Shanghai.
But, now to Strindberg, who has a brilliance that is revealed in new insights in this short course and like Ibsen, anticipates Modernism. I include just a few notes that may be of interest to others.
Impact on other playwrights: Eugene O'Neill, when he got the Noble Prize, said Strindberg was his greatest influence, in particular in "Dance of Death". Strindberg himself felt, that "greater naturalism" made literature like a science". Kafka would say, of Strindberg, "He is in our blood". Samuel Beckett when he saw "Ghost Sonata" performed, said the theater has possibilities which he had not seen. Strindberg had a great impact on the Russian poet, Alexander Blok. Schoenberg considered turning" To Damascus" into an opera, but chose a work by Thomas Mann, instead. Strindberg's "marriage as war" inspired William Faulkner. Henry Miller is inspired by Strindberg's "Inferno", and Philip Roth's early novel is based on Strindberg.
In his education, Strindberg was persuaded by the writings of Rousseau and then by Nietzche, and when in Paris, by Emile Zole. Attending Upsalla University, he was interested in Darwin, and read Kierkegaard, and admired the colloquial and realistic speeches in Shakespeare's plays.
(I met the Eugene O'Neill foundation Director, and learned that his home and theater are here in Danville, California when exiting the lecture. }
Ibsen's exposition of characters and his "slice of life" approach were both rejected by Strindberg. He felt Ibsen had based "the husband" in his "Wild Duck" on himself!
Interarts: Photography and Painting: Strindberg was a photographer, as well as a painter, and his canvasses were strong and expressionistic. He was good friends with the great Swedish painter, Carl Larsson who illustrated the "ordinary" life in Sweden. Like Constable, and Stieglitz, he was interested in "cloud studies". He envisioned the writer as an alchemist, and invented a wonder camera...
In the lesser known "Ghost Sonata", Ulf Olsson brings to our attention, the fact that Strindberg's own childhood was a "hell", giving rise to his view: "Family...the home of all social evil, a charitable institution for comfortable women, an anchorage for house-fathers, and a hell for children" Often regarded for his misogyny, Strindberg is amplified in this approach.
Interarts: Playwrighting and Music: "Ghosts Sonata: The title is from Beethoven's Piano Sonata no 1 in D Minor and Piano Trio no 4 in D Major...The lecturer goes on to show how the playwright mimicked the movements in his play, to aspire to the level of music modeled on the the rhythms and patterns in the Sonata Form. The question in the play is : "Where is beauty?"
Strindberg makes"fictive biography not a fixed identity; "We invent ourselves, perform ourselves constantly."
My note:
What a gift lifelong learning is. I took away such a more vivid and balanced picture of Strindberg, than my previous experience with his best known plays, "Miss Julie" and :Dance of Death". Ulf Olsson, the lecturer was excellent, is a comparative lit professor at the University in Stockholm, his home. He is a Strindberg expert and his most recent book is "Silence and Subject in Modern Literature: Spoken Violence" (Palgrave, Macmillan, 2013)
The syllabus:
Introduction: the Madman - A discussion of Strindberg’s autobiographical writings against a backdrop of Swedish and European history, as well as a look at the different images of Strindberg produced by both psychiatry and literary history. Suggested Reading: ”Deranged Sensations” (essay) (description of a trip on the train!) 2. The Compulsive Critic: A Writer at Work - From left-wing to right-wing, and back again: a critic constantly at work – socialist, anarchist, atheist, reformed Christian, fundamentalist, antifeminist, conservative moralist, reactionary, radical reactionary… We will discuss the different standpoints - good, bad and even worse… - and try to understand the logic behind all these shifts in opinion. Suggested Reading: “Small Catechism for the Underclass” (essay)(great irony, I would say, like Bertold Brecht, in "Three Penny Opera". 3. Realism, Naturalism, and Experimental Writing: The Playwright - most influential as a playwright, Strindberg pushed realist drama into naturalism, and eventually became a leading experimental and Modernist writer. Suggested Reading: Ghost Sonata (plays) 4. The Chemist, the Painter, the Photographer: A Jack of all Trades - Strindberg not only wrote, he employed many forms of creative work: he tried to create gold, he welcomed the new visual technology of photography and experimented with it, and if he sometimes had trouble finding inspiration to write, he would turn to painting to recharge his batteries. Ridiculed by art critics of his time as a dilettante, he is today the most highly priced Swedish painter ever. Suggested Reading: ”The New Arts! ( Fascinating! Strindberg was far more Modernist, than has been recognized)
Having visited Strindberg's last apartment in Stockholm, when I visited Sweden for one month, one lovely June, giving a paper on the comparative study of Emily Dickinson's poems set to music by the composers Aaron Copeland and John Adams, in Lund university, for an international interarts conference that was fascinating---- I was happy to have a chance to learn more, from a professor who has written a book on Strindberg, and is based at the University in Stockholm.
Strindberg is not as familiar to me, as Heinrick Ibsen, about whom I wrote the paper, which is published now in 2012, in an anthology of about 100/300 papers gathered together, for that conference. It was presented at the International Ibsen Society meeting in Fudan University in Shanghai, China and focused on my specialty, interarts relations. In this case, the composer Grieg, and the artist, Munch, and then the architectonics(architecture metaphor) of "The Master Builder". This paper was fascinating to research, and the materials on houses and churches and buildings in Norway were provided to me by the Norweigan Consul in Shanghai.
But, now to Strindberg, who has a brilliance that is revealed in new insights in this short course and like Ibsen, anticipates Modernism. I include just a few notes that may be of interest to others.
Impact on other playwrights: Eugene O'Neill, when he got the Noble Prize, said Strindberg was his greatest influence, in particular in "Dance of Death". Strindberg himself felt, that "greater naturalism" made literature like a science". Kafka would say, of Strindberg, "He is in our blood". Samuel Beckett when he saw "Ghost Sonata" performed, said the theater has possibilities which he had not seen. Strindberg had a great impact on the Russian poet, Alexander Blok. Schoenberg considered turning" To Damascus" into an opera, but chose a work by Thomas Mann, instead. Strindberg's "marriage as war" inspired William Faulkner. Henry Miller is inspired by Strindberg's "Inferno", and Philip Roth's early novel is based on Strindberg.
In his education, Strindberg was persuaded by the writings of Rousseau and then by Nietzche, and when in Paris, by Emile Zole. Attending Upsalla University, he was interested in Darwin, and read Kierkegaard, and admired the colloquial and realistic speeches in Shakespeare's plays.
(I met the Eugene O'Neill foundation Director, and learned that his home and theater are here in Danville, California when exiting the lecture. }
Ibsen's exposition of characters and his "slice of life" approach were both rejected by Strindberg. He felt Ibsen had based "the husband" in his "Wild Duck" on himself!
Interarts: Photography and Painting: Strindberg was a photographer, as well as a painter, and his canvasses were strong and expressionistic. He was good friends with the great Swedish painter, Carl Larsson who illustrated the "ordinary" life in Sweden. Like Constable, and Stieglitz, he was interested in "cloud studies". He envisioned the writer as an alchemist, and invented a wonder camera...
In the lesser known "Ghost Sonata", Ulf Olsson brings to our attention, the fact that Strindberg's own childhood was a "hell", giving rise to his view: "Family...the home of all social evil, a charitable institution for comfortable women, an anchorage for house-fathers, and a hell for children" Often regarded for his misogyny, Strindberg is amplified in this approach.
Interarts: Playwrighting and Music: "Ghosts Sonata: The title is from Beethoven's Piano Sonata no 1 in D Minor and Piano Trio no 4 in D Major...The lecturer goes on to show how the playwright mimicked the movements in his play, to aspire to the level of music modeled on the the rhythms and patterns in the Sonata Form. The question in the play is : "Where is beauty?"
Strindberg makes"fictive biography not a fixed identity; "We invent ourselves, perform ourselves constantly."
My note:
What a gift lifelong learning is. I took away such a more vivid and balanced picture of Strindberg, than my previous experience with his best known plays, "Miss Julie" and :Dance of Death". Ulf Olsson, the lecturer was excellent, is a comparative lit professor at the University in Stockholm, his home. He is a Strindberg expert and his most recent book is "Silence and Subject in Modern Literature: Spoken Violence" (Palgrave, Macmillan, 2013)
The syllabus:
Introduction: the Madman - A discussion of Strindberg’s autobiographical writings against a backdrop of Swedish and European history, as well as a look at the different images of Strindberg produced by both psychiatry and literary history. Suggested Reading: ”Deranged Sensations” (essay) (description of a trip on the train!) 2. The Compulsive Critic: A Writer at Work - From left-wing to right-wing, and back again: a critic constantly at work – socialist, anarchist, atheist, reformed Christian, fundamentalist, antifeminist, conservative moralist, reactionary, radical reactionary… We will discuss the different standpoints - good, bad and even worse… - and try to understand the logic behind all these shifts in opinion. Suggested Reading: “Small Catechism for the Underclass” (essay)(great irony, I would say, like Bertold Brecht, in "Three Penny Opera". 3. Realism, Naturalism, and Experimental Writing: The Playwright - most influential as a playwright, Strindberg pushed realist drama into naturalism, and eventually became a leading experimental and Modernist writer. Suggested Reading: Ghost Sonata (plays) 4. The Chemist, the Painter, the Photographer: A Jack of all Trades - Strindberg not only wrote, he employed many forms of creative work: he tried to create gold, he welcomed the new visual technology of photography and experimented with it, and if he sometimes had trouble finding inspiration to write, he would turn to painting to recharge his batteries. Ridiculed by art critics of his time as a dilettante, he is today the most highly priced Swedish painter ever. Suggested Reading: ”The New Arts! ( Fascinating! Strindberg was far more Modernist, than has been recognized)
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