The Strindberg Museum in Stockholm - and Strindberg's home

Have you visited the Strindberg Museum in Stockholm and Strindberg's home? Yesterday we went on a little museum tour of Stockholm with our electric bikes. One of the museums we managed to visit was the Strindberg Museum on Drottninggatan. Surprisingly nice and interesting!

Strindberg Museum in Stockholm

I (Helena) visited the Strindberg Museum sometime during high school, but it's been a few years since then ... I had almost forgotten about it, until we started googling for museums. We wanted to visit this museum!

The Strindberg Museum is located high up on Drottninggatan, near Tegnérlunden, in an ordinary residential building. This is where August Strindberg lived for the last four years of his life.

Basic exhibition at the Strindberg Museum

There is a basic exhibition at the Strindberg Museum, focusing on Strindberg's life, works and ideas. We really liked the timeline that greeted us when we entered - here we could see Strindberg's life from his birth in 1849 to his death in 1912.

Some exhibitions are difficult to absorb and grasp, but this one is really clear - without oversimplifying reality. On one wall you can "play" with different words that describe August Strindberg and show his often contradictory sides - sociable but reclusive, misogynist but gender debater, combative but peaceful, atheist but religious.

There were many contradictions in Strindberg's life. At the Strindberg Museum, for example, we learnt how Strindberg first expressed himself as anti-Semitic, but later immersed himself in Jewish mysticism and studied Hebrew.

He was religious in many ways, but despite this he was accused of blasphemy and put on trial when he argued in his book 'Married' that it was fraudulent to see the wine and bread in the Eucharist as the body of Jesus "because the wine was 'Högstedt's Piccadon at 65 öre a jug'.’”.

As you may know, Strindberg also had a mental crisis, which he described in his book Inferno. That he originally wrote that book in French, however, was completely new to me!

About Strindberg's works and wives at the Strindberg Museum

August Strindberg was only 63 years old, but he still managed to produce a large number of novels and plays, as well as working as a visual artist. Among his most important works are Master Olof, Hemsöborna, Miss Julie, Fadren, Giftas, Inferno, Ett drömspel, Dödsdansen, Till Damaskus and Röda rummet.

Strindberg also had three wives: the Finnish-Swedish actress Siri von Essen, the Austrian journalist Frida Uhl and the Swedish actress Harriet Bosse. With Siri he had three children (Karin, Greta and Hansel), with Frida a daughter (Kerstin) and with Harriet a daughter (Anne-Marie). Despite several marriages, he lived his last years alone in his apartment on Drottninggatan.

Strindberg's home in the Blue Tower

When you visit the Strindberg Museum in Stockholm, you can also see August Strindberg's residence in the Blue Tower, at Drottninggatan 85. This is the only one of Strindberg's 24 apartments in Stockholm that can be seen. He lived here for the last four years of his life, between 1908 and 1912. The house was almost completely new when Strindberg moved in and very modern with central heating, WC and a lift.

Most of the furniture in the apartment is original, while the wallpaper has been reconstructed. Here you can see where Strindberg sat and worked, and where he ate. He had no kitchen, but he rented the apartment from Falkner's boarding house on the fifth floor, and they provided him with food, which he ate in his apartment.

You can also see the bed where August Strindberg took his last breath in 1912, after a bout with stomach cancer. When his coffin was taken to the Northern Cemetery, the streets were lined with around 60 000 people, which at the time represented one fifth of Stockholm's population.

Don't miss the Strindberg quote on Drottninggatan.

We were pleasantly surprised after visiting the Strindberg Museum in Stockholm. Nice and interesting! When you exit the museum, you can continue your Strindberg visit by reading the quotes written in the centre along Drottninggatan.

Have you visited the Strindberg Museum in Stockholm? What is your relationship with Strindberg, have you read any of his novels or seen any of his plays?

Facts about the Strindberg Museum in Stockholm

• Address: Drottninggatan 85, 111 60 Stockholm
• Find here: Subway station: Rådmansgatan, exit Sveavägen/Tegnérgatan.
• More info: You can find more information at the museum's website

Opening hours

• Opening hours: Tuesday - Sunday 12-16.
• Opening hours 1 July - 16 August: Tuesday - Sunday 10-16.
• Closed days: The museum is closed on Mondays and certain public holidays, such as Christmas Eve, New Year's Eve, New Year's Day, Good Friday, 1 May, National Day and Midsummer's Eve. See the museum's website for current information.

Prices

• Adults: 75 crowns (2020)
• Students, pensioners and the unemployed: 50 (2020)
• Children: Free admission up to 19 years old (2020)
• General screenings: 25 plus entrance fee (children and young people up to 19 years old go free).
• Guided tours for groups: See prices on the museum's website.

Displays

• General screenings: Strindberg's home is shown by guide Thursday - Sunday at 13:00 (2020). Tickets can be purchased one hour in advance.
• Guided tours for groups: Tours for groups can be booked by phone. The maximum number of people per tour is 16 (32 for a double tour).
• Themed displays: The museum offers various themed tours, for example on Strindberg and the visual arts. They can also give talks at associations, workplaces, etc.

Accessibility

• Accessibility of premises: The museum is located in an ordinary residential building and is not accessible. The home and exhibition rooms are on the 4th floor. The library is on the 6th floor.
• Hiss: A lift is available. There are 5 steps between the street level entrance and the lift. There is a wheelchair ramp that can be laid out on request. The lift door is 62 cm wide. The lift car is 1 metre wide and 91 cm deep.
• Doors: The museum's entrance door has an opening of 1 metre and a lower threshold. The doors in Strindberg's home have opening dimensions that vary between 60 cm and 80 cm. Most doors have a threshold. The doors of the exhibition rooms have an opening dimension of 90 cm.

Exhibitions and Collections

• Exhibitions: There is a core exhibition, as well as temporary exhibitions. See the museum's website for the current exhibition.
• Library: The Strinberg Museum's Strindbergiana Library is a specialised library with a collection of about 5000 volumes by and about August Strindberg. The library is primarily available for research, postgraduate studies, artistic or journalistic work etc.
• Objects: Collection of items in the categories of cultural history, art, theatre history, photography, press cuttings, library and audiovisual media.