Henrik Ibsen's hometown Skien Norway

Kai Bonsaksen | Live the World

November 23, 2022

Born in 1828. He's regarded as the most important playwright after Shakespeare. Norway didn't previously produce any writers that were on the international level in the way Ibsen was.

Another big writer is Shakespeare and his hometown. An additional great mind who wrote science things is Einstein and his hometown.

One of the oldest cities in Norway is Skien in Telemark. It was established around the year 1000 and the great birthplace of the legendary write Henrik Ibsen. An older city of Norway is Tønsberg the first city.

He said that to understand him you must understand Norway.

Henrik Ibsen was a failure until he was 36. He made a book that he got printed. The paper of that book ended up being sold to fishermen for putting the fish inside. Before, selling your book like this was considered a failure, today that it could pass as resourcefulness. Ibsen is a big inspiration for not losing hope. His own plays failed miserably and he then got up and succeeded.

His childhood home Stockmanngården

This was actually a business yard which was renamed to the birthplace of Henrik Ibsen. The father of Henrik, Knud Ibsen was in this house producing wine, yarn and cotton goods, canvas, ivory chamber, mirrors, glass and brass items, optical items and butterfly spikes. In 1886, there was a city fire and this house along with many others burnt to the ground.

Skien leisure park (Fritidspark)

In the leisure park, you get to work as hard as you want in the gym, go swimming and dive as much as you want to. This is not all, you have tons of opportunities for what to do. Any time of the year, this place is open. Take an hour in the work out section and one hour in the food section to stabilize yourself.

You can look forward to the most active place in Skien and they have a climbing section, too! The climbing section is outside in the beautiful Norwegian nature. Kids at a very young age can climb here. There's also tough challenges as well that the young kids should stay away from.

There's a jumping tower in the pool. A jumping tower is those floating air towers that are usually on the ground outside. Inside here, they put it in the water. They also have multiple slides in the swimming area. Inside you'll also find a Frisbee course where you can complete challenges. You can use it for free and you can get a Frisbee in the city stores.

The Telemark water canal

This canal was finished in 1892. The route goes from Skien to Dalen. Take a charter boat, a ferry, or your own boat and go through this astonishing pathway by the waters of Norway. You'll easily get a Kayak if you want. If you don't like boats, you can use a land-based vehicle to explore the canal. This will happen on the side of the canal as there's a pleasant and beautiful road on the side. A popular boat that travels this path is the ''Henrik Ibsen'' boat. You'll meet a bunch of locals on this boat. You'll get free refills on your coffee if you want.

The Henrik Ibsen statue in the Ibsen park

One time, on his birthday, the city put a gold crown on his head and kids sang happy birthday for him. The statue is located in Ibsenparken and has the city's astonishing church in the background. I've seen a trend of students coming to this park to write when they are inspired.

The Ibsen theatre

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