La Dame de la mer

The Lady from the Sea was written in Munich in 1888. The earliest extant draft is dated June 5th 1888, but as usual Ibsen had been thinking about the subject for some time. A number of elements derive from his stay in Molde in the summer of 1885. It is assumed that Ibsen not only used Molde as his model for the little "town by a fjord in the northern part of Norway" where the action takes place; he was also said to have heard two legends there that made an impression on him, and which he used in the play. One of them told of a Norwegian of Finnish stock whose magically compelling eyes lured a parson`s wife away from her husband and home. The other one told of a seaman who had been away from home so long that he was thought to be dead, until he suddenly appeared and found his wife married to another man.

Titre original : Fruen fra Havet (1888)