Ghosts by Henrik IbsenGhosts by Henrik Ibsen

This dramatization of Henrik Ibsen's play Ghosts opens with Jakob Engstrand attempting to convince Regina, his daughter and a maid in the Alving household, to come work for him. She refuses, happy with her position in a proper household, but we are soon introduced to scandal and moral debate when we learn from Mrs. Alving that Regina is actually the daughter of the philandering late Mr. Alving and when we meet Oswald Alving, Mrs. Alving's son who she has let grew up abroad in hopes of distancing him from her husband's influence. The developing drama and responses of the characters pose critical questions about Norwegian concepts of class, marriage, faith, love, charity, reputation, and morality. As we close on the Alving family, each member's sense of identity and morality deconstructed, Mrs. Alving is struggling with the idea of euthanizing her son, who is suffering with syphilis contracted from his father.