Lars Norén

Lars Göran Ingemar Norén (9 April 1944 – 26 January 2021) was a Swedish playwright, novelist and poet. He was a director at the Royal Dramatic Theatre, artistic director of Riksteatern 1999–2007, and artistic director of Folkteatern in Gothenburg 2009–2012. Norén is commonly acknowledged as the foremost Swedish playwright since August Strindberg, and the great contemporary Nordic playwright alongside Jon Fosse. His dramatic work has been performed widely throughout Europe as well as in China and South America.

Norén's work spans across genres and styles, and explores existential and social themes. The dramatic works are driven by a poetic dialogue, with elements of absurdity and humour. Recurring motifs are the Holocaust, nightly quarrels in bourgeois families, alcoholism, and the socially marginalised.

The prefix Norén- is used figuratively in Swedish compound words, such as Norénjul ('Norén Christmas'). It refers to common themes in Lars Norén’s work, and evokes a sense of anxiety, a bleak domestic atmosphere, bitter conflict, excessive alcohol consumption, guilt, and shame. A 'Norén Christmas' is the antithesis of the idyllic 'Bergman Christmas' depicted in Fanny and Alexander.

Career

Lars Norén's body of work is prodigious. He wrote and published well over 120 plays, seventeen volumes of poetry and fifteen volumes of prose including a five-volume diary made up of 6,300 pages. His dramatic work is written for the stage, television, and the radio.