Free Essays on Hedda Gabler

In Henrik Ibsen’s play Hedda Gabler, the main character, Hedda Tesman represents a manipulative and powerful young woman seeking to control the lives of those around her. Although Hedda lives in the Victorian era where the women are to live in the shadow of the men, she defines herself negatively. Hedda destroys the things which she cannot accept. The critic John Northam defends Hedda’s character when he states in Ibsen: A Critical Study, â€Å"Hedda is caught in the contradiction of being simultaneously a person whose deepest urges are towards a poetry of living- defined at least approximately by her recurrent use of key terms- but whose social position has educated her to accept [. . .] the restraints demanded by society. The basic conflict is between the self and society (180). Though Hedda lives in a society that suppresses restraints on the women, it gives her no right to be an unworthy, detestable, repulsive, despicable human being. In Act I, it demonstrates a pathological quality of Hedda’s personality early on. Hedda cruelly insults Aunt Julia by complaining that the servant left her bonnet lying in the chair, â€Å"Look there! She has left her old bonnet lying about on a chair† (9). Hedda is never satisfied with anything and she always feels a need to stir up some sort of commotion. By complaining about the bonnet left on the chair, Hedda tries to undermine Aunt Julia’s sense of worth. Again in Act I, Hedda shows more of her negative side when she demonstrates characteristics of manipulation and control. When Hedda and Thea are conversing in the parlor, Hedda insist that they use the familiar form of you when speaking to each other, â€Å"No, not at all! I can remember quite distinctly. So now we are going to renew our old friendship. There now! You must say du to me and call me Hedda† (15). As old schoolmates, Hedda and Thea were merely acquaintances. She wants to renew their friendship with pu... Free Essays on Hedda Gabler Free Essays on Hedda Gabler In Henrik Ibsen’s play Hedda Gabler, the main character, Hedda Tesman represents a manipulative and powerful young woman seeking to control the lives of those around her. Although Hedda lives in the Victorian era where the women are to live in the shadow of the men, she defines herself negatively. Hedda destroys the things which she cannot accept. The critic John Northam defends Hedda’s character when he states in Ibsen: A Critical Study, â€Å"Hedda is caught in the contradiction of being simultaneously a person whose deepest urges are towards a poetry of living- defined at least approximately by her recurrent use of key terms- but whose social position has educated her to accept [. . .] the restraints demanded by society. The basic conflict is between the self and society (180). Though Hedda lives in a society that suppresses restraints on the women, it gives her no right to be an unworthy, detestable, repulsive, despicable human being. In Act I, it demonstrates a pathological quality of Hedda’s personality early on. Hedda cruelly insults Aunt Julia by complaining that the servant left her bonnet lying in the chair, â€Å"Look there! She has left her old bonnet lying about on a chair† (9). Hedda is never satisfied with anything and she always feels a need to stir up some sort of commotion. By complaining about the bonnet left on the chair, Hedda tries to undermine Aunt Julia’s sense of worth. Again in Act I, Hedda shows more of her negative side when she demonstrates characteristics of manipulation and control. When Hedda and Thea are conversing in the parlor, Hedda insist that they use the familiar form of you when speaking to each other, â€Å"No, not at all! I can remember quite distinctly. So now we are going to renew our old friendship. There now! You must say du to me and call me Hedda† (15). As old schoolmates, Hedda and Thea were merely acquaintances. She wants to renew their friendship with pu... Free Essays on Hedda Gabler Henrik Ibsen wrote Hedda Gabler in 1890. It takes place in the Tesman’s house in Norway. The main characters are Hedda, the well-bred aristocratic daughter of the famous General Gabler, George Tesman, Hedda’s newlywed husband and an intelligent scholar, Juliana Tesman, George’s aunt who supports and raised him, Mrs. Thea Elvsted, a childhood friend of Hedda’s, Judge Brack, a worldly and cynical man who likes to meddle in people’s affairs, and Eilert Loevborg, Tesman’s biggest academic competitor and a former suitor of Heddas. The play starts off as Hedda and George are just getting back from their six-month honeymoon. George has gone through great lengths to purchase the house that he thinks Hedda so badly desires. He is not a rich man and Hedda is accustomed to living a wealthy lifestyle. Hedda does not love George, but he is ignorant to that fact. She has only married him because she thought he had more money than he really does. Hedda thinks it will be a marriage of convenience. She is bored with his dull personality and despises his family and the fact that she is tied there. Throughout the play it is hinted that Hedda is pregnant. She confides to Judge Brack that ‘she has made her bed and now she must lie in it.’ Hedda is deeply stirred by the return of her former suitor, Eilert Loevborg. He was once a drunk and a public outcast, but now is an aspiring writer and scholar. Eilert has a close relationship with Mrs. Elvsted. Together they have written a brilliant manuscript, which is portrayed as ‘their child’. Their relationship makes Hedda extremely jealous. One night all the men go out drinking and Eilert ends up losing the manuscript on his way home. He is so ashamed he cannot remember what happened to it that he lies to Mrs. Elvsted and tells her he destroyed it. George found the manuscript and brought it home with intentions to give it back to Eilert after he sobers up. In the meanti...