1. The quotations from the source text refer to the standard edition: August Strindbergs Samlade Verk, 27 (ed. Ollén, Gunnar), Stockholm 1984, pp. 11–15.Google Scholar The English translations, if not otherwise indicated, are mine.

2. After 1933 the Captain's Christian name has received very special connotations. Although Freddie Rokem does not comment on the name in his analysis of a recent production in Tel Aviv (in which the ending, incidentally, preceded the beginning), one can hardly imagine that the name was retained in Israel. Was it omitted the few times it is used in the dialogue? Or was it replaced by another name? — Freddie Rokem, ‘Strindbergs Fadren på Habima-teatern i Tel Aviv’ [Strindberg's Tne Father at the Habima Theatre in Tel Aviv], Strind-bergiana, 5, Stockholm 1990, pp. 100–4.Google Scholar

3. Sw.: Ryttmästarn. Kort och gott: är du far till barnet eller inte? / Nöjd. Hur ska en kunna veta det? / Ryttmästarn. Vad för slag? Kan du inte veta det? / Nöjd. Nej si det kan en då aldrig veta, [my italics]

4. Sw.: Pastorn. […] Tycker du inte att det är ohederligt att lämna en flicka så där på bar backe med ett barn? Tycker du inte det? Va! Anser du inte att ett sådant handlingssätt…hm, hm!… / Nöjd. Jo, se om jag visste att jag vore far till barnet, men se det kan en aldrig veta, Herr Pastorn. [my italics]

5. The medical development since the time the play was written has actually turned The Father — like Ibsen's Ghosts — into an ‘historical’ play, since the thesis concerning the impossibility of proving fatherhood is now obsolete. This change in perspective presents a problem if the play is updated in production — as when Gunnel Lindblom chose to set it close to the 1970s. See Ollén, Gunnar, Strindbergs dramatik, Stockholm 1982, p. 116.Google Scholar

6. Sw.: Ryttmästarn.…Pojken är nog inte sä oskyldig, det kan man inte veta, men ett kan man veta: och det är att flickan är skyldig, om det nu skall vara någon skuld.

7. Sw.: Nöjd. Ja, nog var jag sta, men det vet väl Pastorn med sig själv, att det inte behöver bli något för det! [my italics]

8. Sw.:…om inte flickan vill, sä blir det ingenting av. [my italics]

9. Breitholz, Lennart, ‘Strindbergs Fadren och den sjuka viljan’, Monsieur Bovary och andra essayer, Stockholm 1969, pp. 181–90.Google Scholar

10. Trying to retain the meaning of the Swedish name, Sprinchorn translates ‘Nöjd’ with ‘Happy’. But Happy, as Barry Jacobs points out, ‘sounds like an affectionate nickname’ rather than an ordinary surname. — ‘Strindberg's Fadren (“The Father”) in English Translation’, Yearbook of Comparative and General Literature, 35, 1986, p. 116.Google Scholar

With regard to charactonyms like Nöjd and Svärd a translator can choose either to keep the names of the source text, in which case he sacrifices the thematic significance of these names. Or else he can choose to find equivalents in the target language, which, as the exemple above demonstrates, is exceedingly difficult. In his French translation of the play, Père, Strindberg changed the Swedish surname (Nöjd) into a French Christian name (Pierre) — rather than into a nickname. Meaning ‘stone’, Pierre retains at least something of the original's charactonym.

11. Sw.: Gud bevare herr Ryttmästarn… resp. Gud bevare Herr Ryttmästaren!

12. Brandell, Gunnar, Drama i tre avsnitt, Stockholm 1971, p. 166.Google Scholar — The windows, we must assume, are in the ‘missing’ fourth wall.

13. Both Carlson and Sprinchorn assume that there are weapons of different kinds on the walls. But the most natural way of reading Strindberg's sentence is to see the guns (Sw. gevär) as merely a specification of the more general term weapons (Sw. vapen).

14. Cf. the diagonal arrangement of the guns in the 1908 production of the play at Strindberg's own Intimate Theatre. See Falck, August, Fem år med Strindberg, Stockholm 1935, p. 215.Google Scholar

15. Wirmark, Margareta, Den kluvna scenen: Kvinnor i Strindbergs dramatik, Stockholm 1988, p. 34.Google Scholar

16. Cf. Miss Julie, where the Count's pair of ‘ridstövlar med sporrar’ (riding-boots with spurs) are handled by Jean shortly before his intercourse with Julie.

17. Sw.: stort, runt bord med tidningar och tidskrifter.

18. Wirmark, loc. cit.

19. Cf. the description of the Captain, Edgar, in The Dance of Death I: ‘Han är klädd i en sliten släpuniform med ridstövlar och sporrar’ (He is dressed in a worn undress uniform with riding-boots and spurs). More obviously than in The Father this domestic dress contrasts with the uniform Edgar shows to the world: ‘paraduniform, kask, kappa, vita handskar’ (dress uniform, helmet, cape, white gloves). August Strindbergs Samlade Verk, 44 (ed. Ollén, Gunnar), pp. 13, 101.Google Scholar

20. Sw.: Ryttmästarn i släpuniform och ridstövlar med sporrar. Pastorn svartklädd, med vit halsduk, utan prästkragar; röker pipa.

21. The translations referred to are the following: Six Plays of Strindberg, tr. Sprigge, Elizabeth, Garden City, N.Y. 1955Google Scholar; The Plays by August Strindberg, tr. Watts, Peter, London 1958Google Scholar; Strindberg, August, The Plays, Vol. I, tr. Meyer, Michael, London 1964Google Scholar; Strindberg, August, Pre-Inferno Plays, tr. Johnson, Walter, Seattle 1970Google Scholar; Strindberg, August, Five Plays, tr. Carlson, Harry, New York 1981Google Scholar; Strindberg, August, Selected Plays, I, tr. Sprinchorn, Evert, Minneapolis 1986.Google Scholar

22. Strindbergs dramatik, Stockholm 1982, pp. 102–120.Google Scholar