A Doll House《玩偶之家》
女主人公娜拉出身中等家庭，美麗活潑，天真熱情。她熱烈而真誠地愛著自己的丈夫海爾茂。為替丈夫治病，她曾冒名舉債，又熬夜抄寫文件，掙錢、省錢，偷偷還債。如果需要，她甚至表示可以為丈夫而死。但她的丈夫(過去的銀行職員，現在的銀行經理)，卻是個虛偽自私的資產階級市儈，他平時管她叫“小鳥兒”“小松鼠兒”，可一旦知道娜拉曾冒名舉債，危及自己的社會名聲和地位時，便一反常態，大罵她是“犯罪女人”，還揚言要剝奪他教育子女的權利，要對她進行法律、宗教制裁。后來，當債主受女友感化，退回了冒名借據時，他又轉變態度，表示要永遠愛她和保護她。經此轉折，娜拉終于看清了自己的“泥娃娃”處境，發現自己不過是丈夫的“玩偶”，于是對保護這家庭關系的資產階級法律、道德、宗教，提出了嚴重懷疑和激烈批判，并毅然離開了這個“玩偶之家”。娜拉是個具有資產階級個性解放思想的叛逆女性。她對社會的背叛和棄家出走，被譽為婦女解放的“獨立宣言”。然而，在素把婦女當作玩偶的社會里，娜拉真能求得獨立解放嗎？茫茫黑夜，她又能走向何處？
The Wild Duck《野鴨》
劇情在兩個家庭間展開，一家是工商業資本家老威利和兒子格瑞格斯；另一家是照相館老板雅爾馬、父親老艾克達爾、妻子基納和女兒海特維格。威利和艾克達爾曾合伙經營一家公司，由于非法交易和威利的狡詐避責，艾克達爾獨自一人鋃鐺入獄。出獄后，威利把自己玩弄過的女仆基納許配給雅爾馬，“幫助”成家立業。格瑞格斯對父親威利的卑劣行為感到憤怒，他在抨擊威利的罪過后離家，并向雅爾馬講了基納和威利通奸的丑事。雅爾馬開始疏遠妻子，并懷疑和厭惡女兒。而海特維格知曉自己的身世后，感到無比恥辱，開槍自殺。
Hedda Gabler《海達 高布樂》
海達貴為高布樂將軍的女兒、大家閨秀，卻嫁給了在她眼里平庸又無趣的學者泰斯曼；她渴望擁有一個品位高尚的社交圈子，可是目之所及卻只有和法官布拉克的曖昧與糾纏；她在才華橫溢、放蕩不羈的浪子勒夫伯格身上寄托著自己也解釋不清的情感和期待，卻又一步一步把他帶向毀滅。海達所期望的世界必須是美的世界。當她發現美在自己的生活里遙不可及之時，她會如何呢？
Master Builder《建筑大師》
講述了一位毀滅性天才的故事。數十年前一場神秘的大火成就了他成為建筑大師的夢想，功成名就的他在晚年渴望更上一層樓。超常的活力、不羈的魅力吸引了年輕女子簇擁在他身邊；年邁的大師行走在道德的邊緣，對青春無限向往，但又懼怕青春的威脅。但惹人艷羨的聲譽背后，索爾尼斯的生活過得并不快樂。
Four Major Plays 1《易卜生四大戲劇1》精選19世紀挪威作家亨利克 易卜生的四部戲劇，包括《玩偶之家》《野鴨》《海達 高布樂》《建筑大師》。其中《玩偶之家》是易卜生的代表作，曾被比做“婦女解放運動的宣言書”，主要寫主人公娜拉從愛護丈夫、信賴丈夫到與丈夫決裂，后來離家出走，擺脫玩偶地位的自我覺醒過程。劇本結構緊湊，情節集中。全劇采用追溯的手法，通過債主的要挾，海爾茂收到揭發信，交代劇情發展的關鍵事件娜拉偽造簽名，然后集中刻畫他們沖突、決裂的過程。
本書為Signet Classics推出的英文原版，由Rolf Fjelde翻譯并作序，Joan Templeton后記，內容完整無刪減，書本小巧便攜。
Four Major Plays
Volume I
A Doll House
The Wild Duck
Hedda Gabler
The Master Builder
Among the greatest and best known of Ibsen’s works, these four plays brilliantly exemplify his landmark contributions to the theater: his realistic dialogue, probing of social problems, and depiction of characters’ inner lives as well as their actions. Rich in symbolism and often autobiographical, each of these dramas deals convincingly and provocatively with such universal themes as greed, fear, and sexual hostility, and confronts the eternal conflict between reality and illusion. These Rolf Fjelde translations have been widely acclaimed as the definitive versions of the major works of the father of modern theater.
Translated and with a Foreword by Rolf Fjelde And an Afterword by Joan Templeton
亨利克 易卜生(1828~1906)，挪威劇作家、詩人、評論家。生于木材商家庭，當過學徒、編輯、劇院藝術指導，具有強烈的個人精神反叛色彩和神秘主義傾向。他的戲劇抨擊時弊，宣傳社會改革，塑造了眾多個人主義英雄形象，反映了激進的小資產階段民主意識。他開拓了歐洲戲劇發展的新道路，被稱為現代戲劇之父。主要作品有：詩劇《彼爾 京特》(1867)，社會悲劇《玩偶之家》(1879)、《群鬼》(1881)、《人民公敵》(1882)、《海達 加布勒》(1890)；其象征性劇作《野鴨》(1884)、《當我們死而復醒時》(1899)等反映其“精神死亡”的思想。
Henrik Ibsen (1828–1906) is one of the greatest dramatists of world literature. His verse dramas Brand (1865) and Peer Gynt (1867) brought him fame in Scandinavia, but he became known throughout the world with twelve prose plays in which he invented what is known as theatrical realism: Pillars of Society (1877), A Doll House(1879), Ghosts (1881), An Enemy of the People (1882), The Wild Duck (1884), Rosmersholm (1886), The Lady from the Sea (1888), Hedda Gabler (1890), The Master Builder (1892), Little Eyolf (1894), John Gabriel Borkman (1896), and When We Dead Awaken (1899). Ibsen made ordinary people, talking about contemporary things in everyday language, proper subjects for the stage, and in so doing earned the title “the father of modern drama.” Ibsen is the second-most widely produced dramatist in the world after Shakespeare.
Rolf Fjelde (1926–2002) is America’s foremost translator of Ibsen. His Ibsen: The Complete Major Prose Plays (1978) and his verse translation of Peer Gynt (1980) are landmarks in Ibsen studies. In 1978, Fjelde was elected founding President of the Ibsen Society of America, an office he held for fifteen years. Fjelde was also a widely published poet and was founding editor of the Yale Poetry Review. He was honored by Norway with the Order of St. Olaf, and by his compatriots with membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
Joan Templeton is the author of the critically acclaimed four-hundred-page monograph Ibsen’s Women, along with many articles on drama in PMLA, Scandinavian Studies, Modern Drama, and elsewhere. She has lectured widely on Ibsen worldwide. She is President of the Ibsen Society of America, a member of the International Ibsen Committee, and editor of Ibsen News and Comment.
