KynochLudvig Holberg (1684–1754) is to Danish theatre what Shakespeare, Molière and Strindberg are to their national stages – and the world stage. During his lifetime, Holberg was a major figure in European literature and thought. In the Nordic region, his work forms the backdrop to writers such as Søren Kierkegaard, Hans Christian Andersen, Henrik Ibsen and Karen Blixen. The quality of Holberg's writings, the universality of his themes, his understanding of stage and auditorium all more than qualify him to resume his role on the international stage. This second volume in a series of new translations presents Holberg's radical defence of women's equal right to education and employment, and two of his witty plays about playing roles, the professional and the self-delusional alike, in life and in the theatre. "Zille Hans-daughter's Gynaicologia, or Defence of Womankind" is a sparkling, witty and bitingly satirical poem 'penned by' a young woman named Zille, the teenage daughter of Hans, in which she dissects the absurdity of male dominance and the patriarchal society. "Erasmus Montanus" follows the self-titled, self-delusional, city-slicker university student (real name: Rasmus Berg) on a visit to the small rural community where he grew up. His arrogant and know-all behaviour throws everyone and everything into outrageous turmoil. The play is a caustic satire about what happens when abstract, unworldly scholarship collides with real life and material needs. In "Witchcraft, or False Alarm", actors in the theatre troupe working in a dormant provincial town are rumoured to be dangerous Satanists. The entire community erupts in a frenzy of terrified conspiracy theory paranoia, reaching the brink of violence before the misunderstanding is cleared up: the overheard 'pact with the Devil' was simply an actor rehearsing his role in a play he hoped would make some money for the empty theatre coffers. "I never tire of reading Holberg's plays." (Henrik Ibsen, 1869)

Ludvig Holberg (1684–1754) is to the Danish stage what Shakespeare, Molière and Strindberg are to their national stages – and the world. In his day, Holberg was part of the European literary canon; in the Nordic region, his work forms the backdrop to writers such as Søren Kierkegaard, Hans Christian Andersen, Henrik Ibsen and Karen Blixen. The quality of Holberg's writing, the universality of his themes, his understanding of stage and auditorium, more than qualify him to resume his place on the international stage. This first volume in a trilogy of new translations starts by presenting Holberg's 'poetics of dramaturgy' in the short treatise Just Justesen's Ref lections on Theatre, followed by two of his robust comedies dealing with power, illusion and dreams of greatness. Jeppe of The Hill depicts the lowly peasant who is momentarily elevated to a position of splendour. Clad in the trappings of his new and powerful status, he is soon well on the way to upending the established social order. But, alas, it was all a stage-managed trick, exposing the fundamental dilemma of (his) existence: "Am I dreaming, or am I awake?" Ulysses von Ithacia is essentially a surreal harlequinade about self-delusion, craving for empire and the heroic roles played in corridors of power. A metatheatrical play exposing the absurdity of war and stripping this pompous ruler of his 'new clothes'. "I never tire of reading Holberg's plays." Henrik Ibsen, 1869

Ludvig Holberg (1684–1754) was the foremost representative of the Danish-Norwegian Enlightenment and also a European figure of note. He published significant works in natural law and history, but also a very important body of moral essays and epistles. He authored several engaging autobiographies and European travelogues, a major utopian novel that was an immediate European succes, interesting satires that advocated women’s education and career, and a large number of comedies. These comedies secured Holberg’s status as the most significant playwright in Scandinavia before Ibsen and Strindberg. Through his extensive oeuvre, but especially through his plays, Holberg had a decisive influence on the formation of modern Danish as a literary language, something that was a self-conscious effort on the part of a man who saw himself as an educator of the public. Despite his contemporary impact at home and abroad and his ongoing popularity in Scandinavia, he remains little known in the wider world of enlightenment studies. It is the aim of this volume to revive Holberg as a major figure from a minor corner of the Enlightenment world by presenting the full variety of his work and giving it a European context.

This work very subtly ridicules the decaying values of its times. Centering on a man who has achieved some status and comes back to his town to flaunt it, this comical piece will rivet the reader's attention.

(Applause Books). Warning: The plays of Political Stages do not make for a quiet evening of theatre. These are the plays which got audiences out of their seats, and sometimes out into the streets. Their words and ideas rumbled ominously down the marble hallways of legislatures and challenged, even threatened, and often changed, the thinking of millions. These are the plays which either lit or reflected the fires of those political controversies which blazed across the American Twentieth Century. Individually, each is a molotov cocktail tossed onto the stage, each a political movement encapsulated in dramatic form. Combined, they constitute both a conflagration and a record of American political and theatrical ideology. Never before, however, have they been collected in one explosive volume. In Political Stages , they have at last been preserved, ever ready to serve at the barricades of subsequent eras. Includes works by Tennessee Williams, Emily Mann, Clifford Odets, Langston Hughes, and others.

Ludvig Holberg is the most important man of letters in eighteenth-century Denmark-Norway and is often referred to as the father of Danish and Norwegian Literature, the Molière of the North, the founder of Scandinavian drama, or even as the first Scandinavian feminist. In all his writings - apart from being a dramatist in his own right - he excelled as a satirist, historian and essayist, Holberg is a true child of the Enlightenment advocating tolerance and moderation. At the same time, however, he transgressed its parameters. He introduced a series of classical genres but also violated their rules; he generally supported absolute monarchy but criticized its deficiencies, sometimes with subtlety, sometimes openly and relentlessly when, for instance, aiming his satire at the outdated educational system. Above all, Holberg was a towering cosmopolitan figure in eighteenth-century intellectual life, extremely well-read not only in the classics but also in contemporary literature. Furthermore, he was one of the most avid travelers of his time. He saw himself foremost as a European writer, attacking provincialism and narrow-mindedness wherever he encountered it. Holberg was strongly influenced by the European intellectual tradition and, in return also impacted literary trends abroad. This volume, written by experts from various countries, attempts to place Holberg in this international context. It highlights both the European influence on him and the influence he exerted in his own time as well as the fascination he holds to this very day because of his probing, critical mind, complex personality and, above all, because of the purely artistic quality and modernity found particularly in his immortal comedies.

These short plays by the great Danish-Norwegian playwright Ludvig Holberg reveal, in brilliant and sparking miniature, his genius for comedy. The plays are here translated into English for the first time, with an introduction by Svend Kragh-Jacobsen, well-known Danish theater critic. In these social comedies Holberg pricks the vanity of snobbery and the worship of riches, deals with the world of the philosophers, and has fun with the theme of common sense. A talkative barber, a scientific charlatan, and an ignorant farmer boy come in for sharp characterization. Originally published in 1950. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

This book presents English translations of eight of the comedies Holberg wrote for the Lille Grønnegade Theatre in Copenhagen in the 1720s. The most extensive collection of Holberg plays available in English, the translation and other materials are based on research materials not available to earlier translators and are thus more accurate.