Agenda
RSS-FeedGastvortrag: Dienstag, 31.03.2026
Mit: Prof. Dr. Giuliano D'Amico (Universität Oslo)
Organisiert von: Prof. Dr. Klaus Müller-Wille
Zeit/Ort: 09:00, SOD 002
Although ghostly metaphors are well-rooted in the literary jargon of Ibsen studies, the figure of the ghost in Ibsen’s plays has garnered scarce scholarly attention. In a current book project I undertake a study of Ibsen’s spectrality; this means focusing on spectral figures that haunt living characters, including the “proper” ghosts that appear on page and stage, and those who participate in the action in other ways, mediated by the speeches of other characters or rendered by sound and/or light effects.
In my presentation I will give a ghostly reading of Ghosts, concentrating on the play’s central spectral figure – the late Chamberlain Alving, who, though never appearing, is incessantly evoked. Rather than interpreting the many references to “ghosts” in Ghosts as mere metaphors, symbols of the uncanny, or reflections on heredity and atavism – interpretations familiar in previous scholarship.
In my presentation I will give a ghostly reading of Ghosts, concentrating on the play’s central spectral figure – the late Chamberlain Alving, who, though never appearing, is incessantly evoked. Rather than interpreting the many references to “ghosts” in Ghosts as mere metaphors, symbols of the uncanny, or reflections on heredity and atavism – interpretations familiar in previous scholarship.