ABSTRACT
Johan August Strindberg wrote Swanwhite in the spring of 1901 as a betrothal gift for his third wife, Harriet Bosse, the young Norwegian actress who had already played the Lady in To Damascus and for whom he had created the part of Eleanora in Easter. In spite of his happiness at having won her hand, for he was deeply in love, Strindberg had followed the penitential dramas To Damascus and Easter with the masterpiece of horror and hatred The Dance of Death. He was eager to repeople his stage with spirits and prove the power of love. Between the conception of Swanwhite and its creation he became a disciple of Maeterlinck’s. In his Naturalist period Strindberg had distrusted his Belgian contemporary; but now that he had been through his “inferno,” Maeterlinck’s philosophy spoke to his condition. Physical love tormented Strindberg all his life, for it seemed always to bring hatred in its wake.
