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The Western Canon Mailing List
Moderator: Paul John Barnette Jr.
Activation Date: March 8, 1997
Current Date:  July 8, 1997
Current Membership: 77
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<How would you describe Peer Gynt's personality in Act one?
<What would be your opinion of Peer if he were an actual person?

Peer's personality seems to be best analyzed by how others treat him.  Women
avoid him, rumors of his behavior precede him, everyone recognizes his tales
as folklore, and other lads scheme to get him drunk to see what bizarre thing
Peer will do next.  Peer doesn't appear to be the most stable of characters.
A few of his actions do shed light on his make-up.  His Walter 
Mitty-like fantasy of himself as Kaiser probably wasn't the first 
daydream reverie in which he lost himself.  His telling of folktales 
with himself as the main character seems to show he has trouble 
discerning between fantasy and reality.  Plus he seems to give in to 
his impulses constantly, whether putting his mother on the roof or 
running off with another's bride-to-be, probably indicating little 
maturity.  All in all, Peer seems to be a little boy in a man's body. 
(Is Peer's age given anywhere?)

Other characters seem to have some sympathy for Peer ("his father was
drunken, his mother is weak"), but it doesn't seem to translate into
sympathetic action.

Dwight Green

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