a blog by Peter Leonard
I travelled by train today to the Swedish town of Jönköping in order to catch the new production of Vilhelm Moberg's classic tale of migration, Utvandrana (The Emmigrants) [English summary].
Originally written in the 1940s, and depicting the immigration from Sweden to the United States in the 1800s, this work has been re-cast by director Farnaz Arbabi to reflect the current issues of integration and migration in northern Europe. Arbabi, who previously directed Jonas Khemiri's 2006 debut play Invasion!, here tackled one of the canonical Swedish authors of the 20th century. And unlike most Swedish authors, Moberg is a name known to many Americans as well as Swedes. I'll try and put together a fuller writeup soon, but for now here are a few pictures of the cast on stage at Jönköpings Teater:
