Ghosts

Ghosts is an 1881 play by Henrik Ibsen in which widow Helene Alving confronts family secrets, inherited illness, and the costs of social hypocrisy.

Helene Alving: The widow at the center of Ibsen’s play, who establishes an orphanage in memory of her late husband. Her effort to protect Osvald exposes the secrets she has long kept.
Henrik Ibsen: A Norwegian playwright whose works helped shape modern drama. He wrote Ghosts as a challenge to moral conventions and respectable appearances.
Syphilis: A sexually transmitted infection caused by the bacterium Treponema pallidum. The play associates Osvald’s inherited illness with syphilis, reflecting period beliefs and stigma.
A Doll’s House: Henrik Ibsen’s 1879 play about Nora Helmer’s marriage, independence, and departure from her family. Like Ghosts, it turns a domestic drama into a public dispute about marriage and morality.
Osvald Alving: Helene Alving’s son, a painter whose illness shapes the play’s final crisis. His diagnosis forces the family’s hidden past into the open.
Norwegian literature: Literature written in Norwegian, encompassing works from medieval texts to contemporary writing. Ghosts emerged from Norway’s literary culture and became one of its best-known plays.
Heredity: The transmission of biological traits from parents to offspring. The play uses inherited illness to connect the son’s fate with his father’s conduct.
Modern drama: Drama that centers contemporary social life and psychological conflict rather than mythic or historical subjects. Ghosts helped establish the domestic social problem play as a modern dramatic form.
Pastor Manders: A clergyman and family adviser in Ibsen’s play, committed to public respectability and conventional morality. His advice helps show how moral conventions sustain the Alvings’ concealment.
Naturalism (theatre): A theatrical movement that sought to portray human behavior and social conditions with observational detail. The play’s domestic setting and pressures reflect naturalist theatrical aims.

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