Strindberg’s “Stronger” to be staged in Tangestan

TEHRAN-The play “The Stronger” written by August Strindberg and directed by Mahsa Ganji will be staged in Ahram City in the Central District of Tangestan County, Bushehr Province.

Ganji will also perform in the play along with Nashmin Shamsizadeh and Mahdieh Arabzadeh. The performance will be on stage at Tangsiroun Theater for three nights from January 22 to 24.

“The Stronger” is an 1889 Swedish play consisting of only one scene. The main characters are two women: Mrs. X, who speaks, and Miss. Y, who is silent, an example of a dramatic monologue.

It explores the power struggle evident in human psychology, confronting the audience with timeless themes of betrayal, infidelity, and hierarchy working within a masculine hegemonic society.

The women present on stage are representative of fragments of one character’s mind. While some parts are incapable of action and controlled by their persona’s ‘agents’, others are capable of speech and autonomy facing the climactic confrontation of a destabilized relationship.

“The Stronger” has a dramatic intensity that few plays possess. Though but one character speaks, the souls of three are skillfully laid bare.

August Strindberg (1849-1912) is Sweden’s foremost dramatist. He was also a schoolmaster, journalist, writer of scientific and political treatises, writer of short stories, poet, essayist, and painter.

As a dramatist Strindberg’s chief strength lies not so much in dramatic technique as it does in his trenchant and searching power of analysis of the human mind. His chief plays are very exact and narrow views of the feminine soul. Some of his own domestic bitterness finds expression in the feminine studies in his plays. He is very fond of showing the power of one character over another. 

A prolific writer who often drew directly on his personal experience, Strindberg wrote more than sixty plays and more than thirty works of fiction, autobiography, history, cultural analysis, and politics during his career, which spanned four decades.

A bold experimenter and iconoclast throughout, he explored a wide range of dramatic methods and purposes, from naturalistic tragedy, monodrama, and history plays, to his anticipations of expressionist and surrealist dramatic techniques.

From his earliest work, Strindberg developed innovative forms of dramatic action, language, and visual composition. He is considered the “father” of modern Swedish literature.

In addition to “The Stronger,” Strindberg’s important one-act plays include “The Outlaw,” “Countess Julie,” “Creditors,” “Pariah,” and “Facing Death”.

SS/SAB