Are all the good projects taken?

I need a big project, I tell myself.  A big book-deal of a project.

Someone's already lived like the Bible told him to.

Mastered French cooking, courtesy of Julia Child.

Done everything Oprah says to do on her show.

What's left?

Ummm....  Ibsen?

I'm a member of the Ibsen Society of America.  Have been for several years.  I'm not an Ibsenist.  I enjoy getting the Ibsen News and Comment, but I've never written an academic paper on Ibsen.  Never presented at a conference on Ibsen.  

Just last night I asked my husband if he remembered why I joined the Ibsen Society.  He didn't.  Neither do I.  But the dues are only $15 a year.  And it feels like a kinda exclusive club.

I just got the most recent issue of the Ibsen News and Comment, and was happily reading Joan Templeton's annual summary of articles on Ibsen when it occurred to me.  I could write an article on Ibsen.  

Except I'm not really an Ibsenist.  

But Henrik and I have something in common.  We both like food.  And I love it when playwrights have food onstage.  Even when characters talk about food onstage.  Best yet, when actors get to make food onstage.  Eating onstage puts the real in realism.  

When I teach A Doll's House, I always bring my college students some macaroons to nibble while we discuss the play.  

Well, I always try.  But evidently macaroons are seasonal.  Sometimes when I teach it in the spring semester, there are no macaroons to be found, not even for ready money.  And then, since I'm perpetually running late, I don't have time to make macaroons from scratch.  So sometimes my spring classes miss out on the macaroons.  And sometimes they get three-month old macaroons, if I've remembered to buy some at Christmas and save them.  You'd be surprised, but three-month old macaroons are not always stale.  I know, because more often than not, my students don't like coconut, and I get left with a lot of macaroons.  And that's how I like it.  

So what if I wrote an article about Ibsen and his food?  Well, maybe not an article.  

And thus is born my blog: Eating Ibsen.  

It's a simple plan.  Read Ibsen.  Eat.  Digest.  Discuss.  Repeat.  

But I'm a little afraid.  

• First off, I'm not Norwegian.  And I don't read Norwegian, which means I can't rely on recipes from vintage Norwegian cookbooks.  
• And I'm no gastronome.  I'm already worried about what I might have to eat.  (Pickled pork??)
• And I live 70 miles away from the nearest big city/speciality food store, so I'm not sure what kind of limits that will impose.  
• Oh, and there's already a book, Dining With Ibsen, by food historian Henry Notaker, but as far as I can tell, it's in Norwegian.  And it's not, as far as I can tell, a play-by-play culinary journey though Ibsen's works with thoughtful discussion, as I plan envision this blog will be.  

But I'm game if you are.  Heck, you can even play along at home, if you're inspired.

Where to start?  How about "The Wild Duck?"  

I know, it's not the beginning of the Ibsen canon.  But why not start with the play that has food in the title?