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Comparative Performance Semiotics: The End of Ibsen's A Doll's House
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 January 2009
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When analysing drama performances in the widest sense of the word, it seems sensible to distribute the large number of signifiers (signifiants) transmitted to the recipient (the spectator and/or the listener) over five codes: (1) language, (2) culture, (3) medium, (4) directorial and (5) actorial signals.
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1. Kowzan, Tadeusz, ‘The Sign in the Theater’, Diogenes, 61, 1968, p. 73.Google Scholar
2. Fischer-Lichte, Erika, Semiotik des Theaters, I, Tübingen, 1983, p. 28.Google Scholar
3. Esslin, Martin, The Field of Drama: How the Signs of Drama Create Meaning on Stage and Screen, London, 1987, pp. 103–5.Google Scholar
4. For an extended discussion of these terms, see Tornqvist, Egil, Strindbergian Drama: Themes and Structure, Stockholm and Atlantic Highlands, N.J., 1982, pp. 15–16, 20–3.Google Scholar
5. The terms are borrowed from Beckerman, Bernard, Dynamics of Drama: Theory and Method of Analysis, New York, 1970, p. 36.Google Scholar
6. The present article in many ways supplements the chapter on Et Dukkehjem/A Doll's House in Törnqvist, Egil, Transposing Drama: Studies in Representation, London, 1991, pp. 62–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
7. Ibsen, Henrik, Samlede Verker (Hundreårsutgave), VIII, Oslo 1933, p. 364f.Google Scholar
8. In the following, I limit myself to a comparison between the textual and the audiovisual media, since a comparison also with the more distant, purely aural radio medium would bring in too many divergent factors. Such a comparison warrants an examination in its own right.
9. A Doll's House, tr. McFarlane, James W., in The Oxford Ibsen, V, London, 1961.Google Scholar—A Doll's House, tr. Michael, Meyer, in Henrik, Ibsen, Plays: Two, London, 1965.Google Scholar—A Doll's House, tr. Peter, Watts, in Henrik, Ibsen, A Doll's House and Other Plays, Harmondsworth, 1965.Google Scholar—A Doll's House, tr. Rolf, Fjelde, in Henrik, Ibsen, The Complete Major Prose Plays, New York, 1965.Google Scholar
10. Neuenfels’ production was broadcast from the Frankfurt theatre on West German television in 1973. My observations are largely based on this televised version.
11. I am indebted to the former librarian of the Royal Dramatic Theatre, Dr Tom Olsson, for permission to see a video recording of Bergman's Stockholm production.
12. Quigley, Austin E., The Modem Stage and Other Worlds, New York, 1985, pp. 99–100.Google Scholar See also Northam, John, Ibsen's Dramatic Method, London, 1953, p. 19.Google Scholar
13. Strictly speaking, stage versions should be discussed in the past tense, text and screen versions in the present tense. However, since I heavily rely on video recordings, even for the two stage versions, I have deemed it wise to let the present tense prevail.
14. The American College Dictionary, New York, 1962.Google Scholar
15. This is my own rendering, closer to the original than that of the four translators, of whom only Meyer retains Ibsen's idea that it is a street door that slams shut.
16. The Field of Drama, p. 9.