Stockholm's Archipelago and Strindberg's

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like interior (SV XLIV: 143, 154). 

A section of the dream in Ett drömspel takes place at Skamsund and 

Fagervik, named as such for the first time.

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 After the claustrophobic 

marriage scene in a town flat, featuring the Daughter and the Lawyer, 

the Officer has taken the Daughter to the seaside. Skamsund, the 

unlucky place, is the first station of their journey (SV XLVI: 54-65), with 

Fagervik, the lucky place, appearing on the background of the bay; 

then the positions are inverted when they visit Fagervik (SV XLVI: 65-

67, 71-79). In Ett drömspel stage directions are detailed, as they must 

describe with precision the transformations in the image flow of the 

dream. The seaside scenery appears however stylized and universal 

rather than realistic and local: it is the archipelago, yet it could be any 

seaside locality.

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Furusund used to be a quarantine station before becoming a seaside 

and health resort where people could, among other things, take mud 

baths.

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 Such historical circumstances are integrated in a fundamental 

leitmotif running through the play: the symbolic interaction of the 

elements Earth, Water, Air and Fire. Air and water is what the scenery 

at the bay between Fagervik and Skamsund mainly consists of; 

furthermore, water and fire give steam in the quarantine station, and 

mud is a mixture of earth and water. The Poet, i.e. the Daughter’s third 

male partner, is introduced here: as he tends to be too ethereal, he 

needs a mud bath every now and then, to restore balance. Although 

the quarantine station was on Furusund (i.e. Fagervik), it is placed in 

Skamsund in the play, because of the symbolic opposition Strindberg 

needs in his literary universe. The sphere of the quarantine station 

includes sickness, suffering, absurd waiting and seclusion. The 

Quarantine Master – who already appeared in Dödsdansen through 

Kurt – is in close touch with this sphere, and his job is in itself a form 

of banishment.

The terms of the opposition between Fagervik and Skamsund in Ett 

drömspel indicate that although human suffering can be caused by 

social injustice, it is found across the social divide. The polyphony of 

suffering in the play accounts for a universal condition, including the 

sunny and elegant resort. Even here many dream-like details are based 

on Strindberg’s real experience of Furusund: the Italian (i.e. Italianate) 

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villas, the masquerade, the clubhouse with its dance and music, the 

ugly upper class girl who does not participate in the dance, and finally 

the rich blind man who is the owner of it all. Strindberg’s in many 

respects happy reunion with the archipelago is thus included, under 

particular conditions, in his pessimistic masterpiece about mankind’s 

suffering.

To the existential perspective in Ett drömspel a decidedly social 

perspective is added by those stories in Fagervik och Skamsund that 

are set in the archipelago.

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 As it happens in Skärkarlsliv, a preface 

offers a skillfully constructed stage direction, a spatial and social 

description that lays the ground for the stories (SV L: 115-117). It 

defines the opposition between the poorer and popular Skamsund 

and the richer and bourgeois Fagervik, whereby the narrator tends, 

this time, to adopt Skamsund’s point of view. The local population on 

Skamsund consists mainly of pilots and pietists, whereas the summer 

guests from Stockholm dominate in Fagervik. The paradisiac vision 

of Fagervik, where ‘everything seems to be arranged for the three-

month-long feast called summer’

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, is seductive for the less privileged 

islanders, like the boy Torkel in ‘En Barnsaga’ (SV L: 118-152) (A Fairy 

Tale), and the three servant girls in ‘De Yttersta och de Främsta’ (SV L: 

275-278) (The Last and the First Ones), but this seduction is deceptive, 

according to the pietists’ (and the narrator’s) way of looking at the 

fortunate island (SV L: 126-127, 278). 

In 'En Barnsaga' the adopted perspective is Skamsund’s. Through 

it a social stance and a clear solidarity with the lower classes make 

themselves heard. The story of the protagonist Torkel is one of poverty 

and deprivation, and to his eyes Fagervik is almost an unreal dream, 

the manifestation of an inaccessible Eden (SV L: 126). He dreams of 

reaching Fagervik one day, although a pietist on Skamsund reminds 

him of Ebal and Gerizim. In this story everything is based on the 

opposition, spatial, social, cultural and ideological, between the two 

localities. When Torkel has managed to get to the other side of the bay, 

in order to work as a servant, he is at first fascinated by the charm of 

the Stockholm bourgeoisie on vacation in the skärgård: white dresses, 

beautiful young people, clubhouse, music, fireworks, leisure and life 

as uninterrupted feast. His perspective changes, however, when he 

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happens to be treated unjustly. He realizes, then, that he is and will 

remain a servant. A feeling of social revolt makes him see the dirt 

and misery behind the attractive façade – in the typical Strindbergian 

unmasking manner we know from many works, the servant Jean in 

Fröken Julie (Miss Julie) being maybe the best known example. In the 

end Torkel becomes a sailor, leaving both Fagervik and Skamsund 

behind.

Pietism is historically important for the culture and identity of the 

population of the archipelago. Strindberg has already used this trait 

in Skärkarlsliv and I havsbandet. The pietists, assiduous Bible readers 

(they are called läsare, readers, in Swedish), can use the archetypes 

of the holy text to distinguish deceptive seduction from authentic 

redemption (Ebal versus Gerizim). Strindberg, quite differently from 

what he did in I havsbandet (where pietism was part of the pariahs’ 

culture that Borg despised), now shows an appreciative attitude towards 

Skamsund’s religious perspective. A chord of sorrow, pessimism and, at 

times, misanthropy is thus struck amid the mythical summer paradise, 

undermining the illusion of happiness cherished in Fagervik’s sphere. 

Through this chord Strindberg can in part also return, with a circular 

movement, to his own cultural roots: pietism, Søren Kierkegaard and 

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and, consequently, to his old social pathos. 

The dialogue and confrontation about pietism between the 

quarantine master and his friend, the post master, in the preface to 

‘Karantänmästarns Berättelser’ (SV L: 153-163) indicates the tendency 

in the book. According to the quarantine master the humble pietists 

teach us to pay more attention to the deep existential questions, and 

to become more spiritual. This anti-materialism, as part of a personal 

Christian belief, is an important element in Strindberg’s post-Inferno 

production. The story of the quarantine master, and of the protagonist 

in ‘Den kvarlåtne’ (SV L: 279-282) (The Man Left Behind), show also 

that Skamsund, ‘Gerizim’, can be chosen by people who come from 

the mainland and want to withdraw from the world, either to hide their 

misery, or because they loathe the constrictions of urban life, its social 

ambition and useless luxury; they are therefore, in spite of everything, 

happy with the purportedly cursed place they live in. 

The collection of poems Ordalek och småkonst was first included 

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