Henrik Ibsen on the ghosts within all of us

“I am half inclined to think we are all ghosts…it is not only what we have inherited from our fathers and mothers that exists again in us, but all sorts of old dead ideas and all kinds of old dead beliefs and things of that kind. They are not actually alive in us; but there they are dormant all the same, and we can never be rid of them. Whenever I take up a newspaper and read it, I fancy I see ghosts creeping between the lines. There must be ghosts all over the world. They must be as countless as the grains of the sands, it seems to me. And we are so miserably afraid of the light, all of us.”

–Oswald Alving  in Henrik Ibsen’s play Ghosts

Henrik Johan Ibsen (March 20, 1828 – May 23, 1906) was a Norwegian playwright and theatre director. Ibsen is considered the world’s pre-eminent dramatist of the 19th century and is often referred to as “the father of modern drama.” He pioneered theatrical realism, but also wrote lyrical epic works. Wikipedia

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