I should start titling these things

Maybe it was just my first reading of An Enemy of the People, but I didn't think it was that great of a play. I mean, it wasn't a bad play. But I didn't think it offered anything ground breaking in the way the story was told. I feel like the baths wasn't a very complex image. Baths have been an image of cleanliness and health since the aqueducts, and probably longer. The fountain of youth is another obvious example. And their being contaminated to show the sickness of society to me wasn't groundbreaking. Being exiled north also isn't that unique of an image. Maybe there is more significance to this, with some relation to Viking myths that I don't know about. Peter's clothing being used to show the stiffness of his character. The foreboding presence yet physical absence of the people in society with the most wealth was also boring.

Maybe it was just my first read, or maybe these literary devices have become boring because this became the play that people copied. Or maybe it is because I haven't seen it acted out. Overall I felt like the play's purpose was to present the dramatic essay that act four was. It seems like I am bashing the play, but that wasn't really my intent. I think that the story was well told and put together, but wasn't that interesting. Maybe I had higher expectations of Ibsen after reading A Doll House and The Master Builder, where even though you could see were the story was going they held your interest.