William Archer (critic)

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William Archer

William Archer (* 23. September 1856 in Perth , † 27. December 1924 ) was a Scottish theater critic , playwright and Ibsen - translator .

life and work

Archer spent much of his childhood in Norway , where he got to know the works of Henrik Ibsen. He graduated from the University of Edinburgh in 1876 and while still a student he became one of the main journalists for the Edinburgh Evening News in 1875 . Archer then spent a year in Australia but returned to Edinburgh again. In 1879 he got a job as a theater critic with the London Figaro and moved to London . Five years later he moved to World magazine , where he stayed until 1905.

In his position as a critic Archer exerted a great influence on the theater scene, helped George Bernard Shaw to notice and also made Henrik Ibsen known through translations. So his Ibsen translation in 1880 The Pillars of Society ( The Pillars of Society ) in London, performed without encountering much response. Archer briefly turned away from the theater itself and published the book English Dramatists of To-day in 1882 , the study Henry Irving in 1883 and Masks or Faces? . 1889 eventually became his next Ibsen translation, A Dolls House ( A Doll's House ), performed, which met with massive criticism because of the content that was more hostile than 1,891 Archers translations ghosts ( ghosts ) and Hedda Gabler were listed. In the meantime, Archer wrote a study on the actor William Charles Macready , which appeared in 1890, and in 1891 a five-volume collection of Ibsen's works in translation, some of which was created in collaboration with other translators, was published.

In 1892 William Archer made a translation of the play Peer Gynt together with his brother Charles Archer, and in 1897 a collection of Archer's own collected reviews appeared under the title A Theater World . Another collection of translated Ibsen plays was published in 1906/1907, as well as in 1907 Archers and H. Granville-Baker's joint, detailed designs for a “National Theater” in A National Theater: Scheme and Estimates . At the beginning of the First World War , Archer was considered the most important theater critic in London. In September 1914 he was invited to join the British War Propaganda Bureau and wrote a series of open letters that put the roles of all those involved in World War I "in perspective". In 1919 Archer helped start the New Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon . In 1932, with The Old Drama and the New , he emphasized the importance of Henrik Ibsen , George Bernard Shaw and John Galsworthy, among others . Also in 1923, The Green Goddess, a self-written piece, was published, which was first produced in the USA and then in London with great success .

William Archer died on December 27, 1924 during an operation to remove a tumor . His Ibsen translations are still the best known and most widespread in the English-speaking world.

Selected bibliography

Theater criticism

  • English Dramatists of To-day (1882)
  • Henry Irving , a study (1883)
  • About the Theater (1886)
  • Study in the Psychology of Acting (1886)
  • Masks or Faces? (1888)
  • William Charles Macready , a biography (1890)
  • The Theatrical World (1893) (5 volumes)
  • America To-day, Observations and Reflections
  • Poets the Younger Generation (1901)
  • Real Conversations (1904)
  • A National Theater: Scheme and Estimates , with H. Granville Barker, (1907)
  • Through Afro-America (1910)
  • The Life, Trial, and Death of Francisco Ferrer (1911)
  • Play-Making (1912)
  • The Old Drama and the New (1923)

Pieces

  • War is War (1919)
  • The Green Goddess (1921)

literature

  • Charles Archer: William Archer: His Life, Work and Friendships. Yale University Press, New Haven 1931.
  • Margaret Drabble (Ed.): The Oxford Companion to English Literature. Oxford University Press, Oxford, New York 1998.
  • Christopher Gillie: Longman Companion to English Literature. Richard Clay (The Chaucer Press), Bungay, Suffolk 1978.
  • Peter Whitebrook: William Archer: A Biography. Methuen, London 1993, ISBN 0-413-65520-2
  • Archer, William . In: Encyclopædia Britannica . 11th edition. tape 2 : Andros - Austria . London 1910, p. 362 (English, full text [ Wikisource ]).

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Archer, William
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Scottish theater critic
DATE OF BIRTH September 23, 1856
PLACE OF BIRTH Perth
DATE OF DEATH December 27, 1924