Ghosts is a play by the Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, first written in 1881 and first performed in 1882 in Chicago. A critical commentary on 19th-century morality, the play immediately generated strong controversy and negative criticism because of its subject matters, which includes religion, venereal disease, incest, and euthanasia. The title of the play in Danish is Gengangere, which could be more accurately translated as 'ones who return'; it has a double meaning of both 'ghosts' and 'events that repeat themselves', so the English title Ghosts fails to capture this double meaning.