Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906), Norwegian poet and playwright, was one of the shapers of modern theatre, who tempered naturalism with an understanding of social responsibility and individual psychology. His earliest major plays, Brand (1866) and Peer Gynt (1867), were large-scale verse dramas, but with Pillars of the Community (1877) he began to explore contemporary issues. There followed A Doll's House (1879), Ghosts (1881) and An Enemy of the People (1882). A richer understanding of the complexity of human impulses marks such later works as The Wild Duck (1885), Rosmersholm (1886), Hedda Gabler (1890) and The Master Builder (1892), while the imminence of mortality overshadows his last great plays, John Gabriel Borkman (1896) and When We Dead Awaken (1899). Samuel Adamson's plays include: Some Kind of Bliss (Trafalgar Studios), All About My Mother (from Almodovar; Old Vic), Fish and Company (Soho Theatre/National Youth Theatre), Southwark Fair (National Theatre), Drink, Dance, Laugh and Lie (Bush Theatre/Channel 4), Grace Note (Peter Hall Company/Old Vic), Clocks and Whistles (Bush Theatre) and contributions to the 24 Hour Plays (Old Vic), A Chain Play (Almeida Theatre) and Urban Scrawl (TheatreVoice/Theatre 503). Adaptations include: Ibsen's Pillars of the Community and Mrs Affleck, from Ibsen's Little Eyolf, (both at the National Theatre) A Doll's House (Southwark Playhouse); Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard (Oxford Stage Company/Riverside Studios) and Three Sisters (OSC/Whitehall Theatre); Schnitzler's Professor Bernhardi (Dumbfounded Theatre/Arcola Theatre/Radio 3) and Bernhard Studlar's Vienna Dreaming (National Theatre Studio). Radio includes: Tomorrow Week (Radio 3). Film includes Running for River (Directional Studios/Krug). He was Pearson Writer in Residence at the Bush in 1997-8.
