Ibsen's Hedda Gabler

Ibsen's characters are clearly products of the society in which they live. The plays of Henrik Ibsen have a strong social content, indicating the views of the playwright on some matters, and more directly showing the way different social issues were developing in the society of his time and the way those issues were in turn shaping that society. He wrote about women's rights, the plight of "whistleblowers," the meaning of social responsibility, the effects of corruption. Ibsen's views and his challenging dramatic methods made him something of a social outcast even as he was becoming one of the world's major playwrights, a voice that would speak to subsequent generations perhaps even more strongly than he did to his own. In Hedda Gabler, several of these themes come together, notably the place of women in society, the meaning of social responsibility, and the effects of corruption on society and on the individual.

In terms of the society of her time, Hedda is somewhat different from other women. She does not fit the mold of the humble wife and does not want to fit that mold. Her father has taught her skills more suitable to a man, such as riding and shooting. She is not thus well prepared for the role of wife, and she has strong romantic notions that derive from her fascination with the military as well as form her lack of training in the usual female role. Hedda Gabler was a girl raised by her military father, and he clearly imposed discipline and order in her young

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illusions about the external world in which she lives, and she has married George Tesman and in doing so found a man who protects her and gives her a certain status. She lives her life in a calculating manner intended to enjoy whatever advantages she can gain. Her system of values is both personal and highly selfish, but it is a system that serves her needs. As the play progresses, this system is destroyed until she sees all power ceded to others. This is a situation she finds intolerable, so much so that she would rather escape this world than endure it. Eilert represents the romantic ideal to Hedda, and he lives his life as she would if she were a man. She learns that this ideal is not as it seemed to her, and she tries in several ways to revive her ideal in her mind if not in the world. Eilert's suicide prevents her from accomplishing this task, and Brack's blackmail shows her that she will never achieve this ideal in this world. Significantly, she decides on the same course taken by Eilert and kills herself, perhaps unconsciously emulating the man she had formerly idealized. She is a woman in a male-dominated society, and she is too strong to live in such a social structure if she is not able to manipulate it to proje

Category: Literature - I