The 306 Greatest Books #81 - Peer Gynt

Note - This review was originally published on my other site "The Geology P.A.G.E." but due to the content I have moved it here and backdated the post.

The next up on my reading of the 306 greatest books is Peer Gynt by Henrik Ibsen. This book can be found on the Sybervision Book List.

Peer Gynt is a play about a boy/man who started out running away from his troubles and inventing imaginary worlds from which to escape into. Although this was not the greatest of plays I have ever read, nor would I even include it on this list, I did not feel it was terrible at least. The moral of the story took a little bit of time to manifest itself but it eventually came. The pacing of the story was also all over the place. At times the story felt rushed, while at other points it dragged on. All if this could be attributed to the translation I read. I noticed that the translator tried too hard to modernize the story, making the text feel severely out of place at times. Overall, I would say that it was not bad but definitely not great.

The 306 Greatest Books #47 - A Doll's House

I am going back and posting all of my previous book reviews so that they are listed on my site in chronological order. The reviews are dated for the time when I read the book, hence the reason many of them will be listed for times before this website existed. 

The next up on my reading of the 306 greatest books is A Doll's House by Henrik Ibsen. This book can be found on the Sybervision, Norwegian, and My Book Lists. 

A Doll's House is interesting because it is basically about the women's liberation movement long before there was ever a movement. The play is about a woman who has done nothing with her life except try to please two men, her father and her husband. However, it is when something tragic happens that she realizes that nothing is as perfect as it seems. The characters were written well and believable, and the story is very easy to read. Personally, I often have some issues reading plays because I feel I miss out on many of the hidden themes. Plays are often a lot denser with material because the "fluff" gets excised that you could potentially have in a novel, so anything left in the play is usually very important for the feel of the play or the plot. However, with A Doll's House I feel like I caught most of the subtle themes throughout the story and it was, like most plays, a very fast read. Definitely on my recommend list.