Think, Dagny, what it is to sit by the window in the eventide and hear the kelpie wailing in the boat-house; to sit waiting and listening for the dead men's ride to Valhal; for their way lies past us here in the north. They are the brave men that fell in fight, the strong women that did not drag out their lives tamely, like thee and me; they sweep through the storm-night on their black horses, with jangling bells! Ha, Dagny! think of riding the last ride on so rare a steed!

He married Suzannah Thoresen on 18 June 1858 and Henrik Ibsen gave birth to their only child Sigurd on 23 December 1859. She sacrificed herself time and again. Ibsen moved to Munich in 1875 and began work on his first contemporary realist drama The Pillars of Society first publiHenrik Ibsend and performed in 1877.

Several of his plays were considered scandalous to many of his era when European theatre was required to model strict morals of family life and propriety. His major works include Brand Peer Gynt An Enemy of the People Emperor and Galilean A Doll's House Hedda Gabler Ghosts The Wild Duck Rosmersholm and The Master Builder. The poetic and cinematic play Peer Gynt however has strong surreal elements.