The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-08-14
From the London Athena cum.

v (O near to Henrik Ibsen to be able to estimate alright his position in the history of European thought and European drama Moreover, such play goers among us as are of moderately mature age have emerged but too re- gently from the storm and conflict in which the earlier performances of Isben's plays were involved not to be willing enough to let the name of the great Norwegian fall temporarily into oblivion along with the controversies during which even that name itself did not escape perversion
 Faced with some young zealot who has just discovered Ibsen and wants our opinion of the god of his idolatry, we are but too apt to tell him that we have outlived his phase of enthusiasm and that we have absorbed Ibsen as our fathers absorbed Carlyle; that he Is part of the very tissue of our mind and that his main inmoprtance in nine teeth century literature was the gen eral influence he exercised-a destruc- tive influence When we are forced Into more explicit statement we begin to talk, perhaps, of the author of Ghosts" and "A Dolls House" as an iconoclast smasher of the social and moral share of his age, a revolutionary who ventilated the theatre with thoughts of fresh air and free thought, dramatic reformer who invented newer and more natural technique for the stage. Whereupon possibly we con- clude our impatient comments by sug- glesting cynically that the technique of Ibsen has already become a little old fashioned; that the conventions with which he replaced those that he de- stroyed-such, for example, as those of the revolt of woman, the triangular situation of sex and the jealousy of the old and the young-have already been in their turn stereotyped; and that finally Ibsens philosophy of life, in so far as 1t may be said to exist at all is reckless, undisciplined individ- ualism, leading to anarchy or-nowhere.
 There is the accent of truth in these contentious but they do not cove all the ground, as a study of the new and collected edition of Ibsens works, edited and prefaced with loving pains by MT. William Archer, will make abundantly clear. mere glance at the mass of literature which came from Ibsen's pen should be sufficient to re- mind us that the debt we owe to him Is something more than clearing of from the thraldcln of convention. or even a better uderstanding of modern woman and her aspirations. For the list of Ibsen's achievements, when we leave out of account the stirring saga plays which belong to his first period of romantic and patriotic enthusiasm,
 includes his two great dramatic poems, "Brand' and Peer Gvnt."
 The former, though 1t is disfgured by Ibsens besetting Sin of vague symbolism, has an austere majesty of it's own which it's companion and even more brilliant work presents a riot of fantasy that is bewildering in its seemingly inevhaus- tble profusion. No reader, again, of Ib- sens could spare the last act of "A Dolls House" or, despite it's exaggerated in- sistence on the doctrine of heredity, the whole bald tragedy of Ghosts" these have left an ineffaceable impression on European thought. Nor should we forget that piteous closing scene of Little Eyolf," in which the Ibsen of full growth allowed for once human characters of his creation to be reconced to the feminine types, women somewhat abnormal be- cause in revolt, women that a happier generation will doubtless marvel at for their unsocial qualities, yet true renec- tions of the sex of their century-Rebecc "a West, ruthless in the satisfaction of her love, but obedient to the higher call when she recognizes. its beauty; Hedda Gabler,
 an anarchist among women, corrupty sensual, neurasthenic irresponsible in her delight in causing mischief; and Hilda Wangei, clear eyed cruel, exacting. ideal lstic. with all the esharpsightedness, the ruthlessness and the uncompromising at titude of youth%
 Finally, not to mention that pregnant dialogue of Ibsen's which has taught even our best novelists hdw possible it is to use the spoken word as sort of short- hand for the underlying thought or emo tion, there are the many phrases of his