What on earth is he doing here?:

You kind of have to look close, but you can see, those of you who keep up with the turn of the century Scandinavian playwrights that a portrait of August Strindberg hangs on the wall of this particular and rather special place, which of course belonged to Henrik Ibsen:

And to remind all of you about Mr. Strindberg, he is this rather happy looking fellow:

We are not at the Strindberg museum. No, this was the last office of Mr. Ibsen, internationally famous Norwegian playwright and master of hilarity. Why do I give him this particular moniker? Well, the portrait of Strindberg hung on the wall of Ibsen’s study because he needed to look at the competition to get inspired. The very knowledgeable woman who gave us the tour of the apartment said that Ibsen knew that Strindberg was younger and nipping at his heels, to get the title of depressingest Scandinavian playwright.

Well, Ibsen turned out to be way less depressing than I could have ever imagined. I learned on the tour that
when Ibsen would get writer’s block, he would take figurines out of his desk that were little devils and put voices onto them. And then probably mutter some kind of four letter words in Norwegian about that Strindberg guy.

The rest of the apartment was interesting, not least of all because of this:

This is not a painting. It is a photograph. I was amazed because when the photo was taken, probably at the turn of the century, such an endeavor was rare and very expensive. Having your photo taken like that one of Ibsen up there was the equivalent of having your portrait done by Andy Warhol in the 1960s.

There was an exhibit too attached to the apartment:

This is Ibsen on his daily walk to lunch, which he always made at 11:30 and came back home at noon. And you got a few tidbits about Ibsen’s later life:

Now this I found funny, slightly for a few reasons. Ibsen was a middle class creature of habit by the time he became a famous playwright. Just like Mark Twain in his later years. The best bit though was the part about Ibsen’s “friendships” with young ladies later in his life, who were later not able to establish normal relationships with other men.

Scandinavian artists. Complicated. And that’s all I’m saying about that one.

And, lastly I attach a photo of Ibsen’s grave and I’ll explain in a minute why:

My friend and I went searching in this cemetery for Ibsen’s grave in the rain and darkness for over an hour. Did I mention that while we were wandering in this graveyard bells started going off, like in some Ibsen play? Dance of Death indeed. Wait, that was Strindberg. Hehehehehe…..