I went to college before CliffsNotes came on the scene. All those classics young people find boring—I had to actually read them. (Okay, not always carefully.) In the intervening years I’ve never gone back to give any of the assignments a second look. That is, until a few weeks ago, when I downloaded Enemy of the People, a play by Henrik Ibsen, a Norwegian playwright of the nineteenth century.

Here’s the gist of the story: A Norwegian town has gone to a lot of expense to attract tourists to its baths. When Dr. Stockman discovers that run-off from a tannery upriver is contaminating the baths, making tourists sick, he assumes that telling the town’s citizens is in their best interest. But no. The baths promise prosperity, and rectifying the problem would be expensive. In a town meeting the mayor, Dr. Stockman’s brother, moves that the doctor not be allowed to…