Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-2pzkn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-08T14:20:07.136Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Renaissance Theatre in Scandinavia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 July 2009

Marvin Carlson
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Though records of medieval drama in Scandinavia are few and fragmentary, they allow us to trace there a tradition similar to that developing in much of Europe at this time. There are surviving examples of quasi-dramatic church ceremonies at Easter and Christmas, of early liturgical dramas such as the famous Quem quareitis, and of later, more elaborate resurrection plays and mysteries. There is a far greater development of dramatic production in Scandinavia after 1500, however, when the church drama of the middle ages gives way to the school drama of the Renaissance. Throughout northern Europe, the schools served as the centers for the establishment of a new style of drama. But nowhere was school drama so exclusively dominant as in Scandinavia where, in contrast to the rest of Europe, it served as the popular and court theatre of this period as well.

Type
Research Article
Information
Theatre Survey , Volume 14 , Issue 1 , May 1973 , pp. 22 - 54
Copyright
Copyright © American Society for Theatre Research 1973

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Notes

1 For material on the medieval drama in Scandinavia, see Huitfeldt-Kass, H. J., Christiania Theaterhistorie (Copenhagen, 1876)Google Scholar; Krogh, T. T., AEldre dansk Teater (Copenhagen, 1940)Google Scholar; Ljunggren, Gustaf, Svenska dramat intill slutet af sjuttonde århundredet (Lund, 1864)Google Scholar; Silverstolpe, C., Svensta teaterns äldsta öden (Stockholm, 1882)Google Scholar; Troels-Lund, , Dagligt Liv i Norden i det 16. Aarhundrede (Copenhagen, 1903–1904)Google Scholar; and Wieselgren, O., Teaterns historia i grunddag (Stockholm, 1933)Google Scholar.

2 Rørdam, Holger, Fra Universitets Fortid (Copenhagen, 1879). p. 16Google Scholar.

3 Werlauff, E. C., kjøbenhavns Universitet (Copenhagen, 1850), p. 16Google Scholar.

4 The origins and development of the school drama in Germany are traced in van Abbé, Derek, Drama in Renaissance Germany and Switzerland (Melbourne, 1961)Google Scholar. See also the article on Celtis by Kindermann, Heinz in Maske und Kothurn I (1959), 33–43Google Scholar.

5 Thura, A., Idea Historiae literariae Danorum (Copenhagen, 1723), p.72Google Scholar. See also Tauber, E. G., Historia scholae cathedralis arhusienses (Arhus, 1817), pp. 21ffGoogle Scholar. for a discussion of Børup and his times.

6 Krogh, pp. 58–59.

7 Kjersgaard, E. and Huitfeldt-Kass, H. J., De første Oldenborgere, Vol. 5 of Danmarks Historie (Copenhagen, 1863), p. 142Google Scholar.

8 Rørdam, H., Københavns Universitets Historie fra 1537–1621 (Copenhagen, 1868), I, 418Google Scholar. Nyerup, R. and Rahbek, R. L., Bidrag til den danske Digtekunsts Historie (Copenhagen, 1801), II, 3nGoogle Scholar.

9 Upsala, , Svenska litteratursälskapets arbetsutskott (Upsala, 1882), III, 64Google Scholar.

10 See Rudwin, M. J., Der Teufel in den deutschen geistichen Spielen des Mittelalters und der Reformationszeit (Göttingen, 1915)Google Scholar.

11 Klemming, G. E., Sveriges dramatiske litteratur till och med 1875 (Stockholm, 1883), p. 10Google Scholar.

12 Ljunggren, , Svenska dramat, p. 211Google Scholar. Eberle, Oskar, in Theatergeschichte der inneren Schweiz, Königsberger deutsche Forschungen, V, Königsberg, 1929) reconstructs the staging of a later Swiss version, presented in the Lucerne Mühleplatz in 1651. Here a dimensional city formed a backdrop with a practical temple and city gate. From this gate, center stage, a step led down to the neutral forestage, which represented the open area before the city (pp. 42–43 and Plate 9, III)Google Scholar.

13 See Eberle, pp. 18–20 and Plate 9, I, for descriptions of such a production in Lucerne in 1537.

14 See Derek van Abbé, Renaissance Germany, p. 119, and Sommerfeld, M., Judith-Dramen des 16.–17. Jahrhundert (Berlin, 1933)Google Scholar.

15 Fabritius, Jakob, “Universitetsregnskaber for Aarene 1540 til 1545,” Danske Magazin, Ser. III, vol. VI (Copenhagen, 1860), 17Google Scholar.

16 Luther, M., Works (Philadelphia, 1960), XXXV, 339Google Scholar.

17 Huitfeldt, , Christiania, pp. 14–15Google Scholar.

18 Brix, Hans, Analyser og Problemer (Copenhagen, 1933), pp. 17, 71ffGoogle Scholar.

19 Wordsworth, J., The National Church of Sweden (London, 1911), pp. 183–246Google Scholar.

20 Luther, M., Tischreden (Berlin, 1848), IV, 592Google Scholar.

21 Luther, , Works, XXXV, 345–346Google Scholar.

22 Until quite recently this anonymous play appeared in Petri's collected works and was credited to him by theatre historians and by his biographers (e.g., Murray, Robert, Olaus Petri [Stockholm, 1952])Google Scholar. The first intensive linguistic analysis of Petri's work was undertaken by Palmér, Johan in “Undersökninger i Olavus Petris språk,” Lunds Universitets Årsskrift, N. S. Part I, vol. XXXV, no. 2Google Scholar. Although Palmér on the basis of this analysis feels that “the language in the Tobias Comedy corresponds with the linguistic usage of Olaus Petri,” (p. 194), such analysis has been questioned by others (See Tigerstedt, E. N., Svensk litteraturhistoria [Stockholm, 1953], p. 97Google Scholar). The question of authorship clearly remains open.

23 Hübertz, J. R., Et Blik paa Staden Aarhus og dens almindelige Historie (Copenhagen, 1837), p. 53Google Scholar.

24 Troels-Lund, T. F., Dagligt Liv i Norden i det 16 Aarhundrede (Copenhagen, 1908), VII, 158Google Scholar.

25 Jacobsen, P. B., “Om Skuespil og Skuespil-Forfattere i Danmark i det 16de Aarhundrede,” Historisk Tidsskrift, Ser. I, vol. V (Copenhagen, 1844), V, 502–503Google Scholar.

26 Huitfeldt, , Christiania, pp. 17–18Google Scholar.

27 Ibid., pp. 19–20.

28 Smith, S. Birket, Studier paa den aeldre danske Literaturs, saerlig Skuespillets (Copenhagen, 1896), pp. 3–5Google Scholar.

29 Reinhardt, C. E. F., “Kommunitetet og Regentsen,” Historisk Tidsskrift, Ser. III, vol. III (Copenhagen, 1862–1864), 127Google Scholar.

30 Resen, P. H., Kong Frederich den Andens Krønike (Copenhagen, 1680), p. 307Google Scholar.

31 Personne, Nils, Svenska Teatern under Gustavianska Tidehvarfret (Stockholm, 1913), p. 17Google Scholar.

32 Bolte, J., “Englische Komödianten in Dünemark und Schweden,” Shakespeare Jahrbuch. XXXIII (1888), 100Google Scholar.

33 Chambers, E. K., The Elizabethan Stage (Oxford, 1923), II, 270Google Scholar.

34 Bolte, pp. 100–101.

35 Knight, A. H. J., Heinrich Julius (Cambridge, 1948), pp. 1–3, 10–12Google Scholar.

36 Hansen, P., Den danske Skueplads (Copenhagen, 1889), I, 53Google Scholar.

37 Kaulfuss-Diesch, H., Die Inszenierung des deutschen Dramas an der Wende des sechzehnten und siebzehnten Jahruhunderts (Leipzig, 1905), pp. 75–84Google Scholar.

38 Wikland, E., Elizabethan Players in Sweden 1591–1592 (Stockholm, 1962)Google Scholar.

39 Christiansen, Peder, Almanakoptegnelser i Kirkehistoria, quoted in Birket Smith, Studier, p. 70Google Scholar.

40 Krogh, , Teater, p. 77Google Scholar.

41 Smith, Birket, Studier, p. 81Google Scholar.

42 Krogh, p. 73.

43 Huitfeldt, , Christiania, pp. 46–47Google Scholar.

44 Krogh, p. 75.

45 Lönnbom, , Anekdoter om namnkunniga Svenska män, quoted in Ljunggren, Svenska dramat, p. 160Google Scholar.

46 Ljunggren, , Svenska dramat, p. 86Google Scholar.

47 Nyerup, and Rahbek, , Bidrag, II, 153Google Scholar.

48 Krogh, pp. 65–66.

49 Schück, Henrik, Messenius (Stockholm, 1920), pp. 78–82Google Scholar.

50 Ibid., p. 91.

51 Ibid., p. 104.

52 Kirkehistoriske Samlinger, quoted in Troels-Lund, , Dagligt Liv, VII, 178–179Google Scholar.

53 Arpe, V., Das schwedische Theater (Göteborg, 1969), p. 9Google Scholar.

54 Schück, pp. 99–102.

55 Holst, Jørgen, Regiae Nuptiae Christiani Vti (Copenhagen, 1637), quoted in Krogh, p. 75Google Scholar.

56 Paludan, J., Danmarks Literatur mellem Reformationen og Holberg (Copenhagen, 1896), p. 169Google Scholar.

57 Personne, , Svenska Teatern, pp. 28–29Google Scholar.

58 Huitfeldt, , Christiania, p. 22Google Scholar.

59 Ibid., p. 23.

60 Krogh, , Teater, p. 78Google Scholar.

61 Ibid., p. 303.

62 Ibid., p. 78.

63 Nyerup, and Rahbek, , Bidrag, II, 159–160Google Scholar.

64 Ljunggren, , Svenska dramat, pp. 374–384Google Scholar.

65 Ibid., pp. 460–62.

66 Krogh, p. 15.

67 Ljunggren, pp. 500–10.

68 Ibid., pp. 516–60.

69 Huitfeldt, , Christiania, pp. 28–30Google Scholar.

70 Holberg, L., Epistler (Copenhagen, 1873), IV, 86Google Scholar.

71 Overskou, T., Den danske Skueplads (Copenhagen, 1854), I, 39Google Scholar.

72 Troels-Lund, , Dagligt Liv, VII, 179Google Scholar.

73 Paludan, J., “Om Dramats Udvikling i Danmark mellem Skolekomedien og Holberg,” Historisk Tidsskrift, Ser. V, vol. II (Copenhagen, 1880–1881), 19–20Google Scholar.