Ibsen in Iran. Dariush Mehrjui’s Transposition of Et dukkehjem (A Doll’s House) and Gengangere (Ghosts) to the Screen

Abstract

<i>Sara</i> (1992) and <i>Ashbah</i> (2014) are the only Iranian movies openly based on Henrik Ibsen’s <i>Et dukkehjem</i> (<i>A Doll’s House</i>) (1879) and <i>Gengangere</i> (<i>Ghosts</i>) (1881), respectively. Both movies were produced in the Islamic Republic of Iran and scripted and directed by the internationally recognized Iranian director Dariush Mehrjui (born 1939). This study examines the ways in which this director, while living in Iran, transposed these literary dramas and their forthright social criticism into movies subtly interrogating the theocracy there. Looking in particular at why and how these adaptations of 19th-century Norwegian plays came about in the Islamic Republic of Iran, this study uses a “dialogical process” approach from adaptation studies in the interests of revisiting source–target textual relations. More specifically, it applies the structure of adaptation analysis described in Linda Hutcheon’s <i>A Theory of Adaptation</i> (2006, 2013). Different transposition processes in the production of <i>Sara</i> and <i>Ashbah</i> demand theories acknowledging the relevance of studying inserted texts in the end product and their degree of proximity to the source. In this regard, then, the study also draws upon Julie Sanders’s <i>Adaptation and Appropriation</i> (2006, 2016), highlighting the analytical importance of spotting intertexts, along with Robert Stam’s suggestion of using Gérard Genette’s transtextuality and narratology in adaptation studies such as this. The analyses of the movies demonstrate that <i>Sara</i> is not a thematically divergent transposition of <i>Et dukkehjem</i>, although it is socially adapted to its target context. While maintaining the themes of the canonical text, <i>Sara</i> is in fact designed to depict the challenging conditions for women in Iranian society. <i>Ashbah</i>, however, is a more playful transposition of <i>Gengangere</i>. While its main storyline is based on Ibsen’s work, the movie is constructed from other texts as well to convert Ibsen’s ideas into a modified narrative addressing Iran’s radical political changes and subsequent homeless generations.