Hedda Gabler. Henrik Ibsen

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СКАЧАТЬ character. It has been represented as an absurdity that he would think of reading abstracts from his new book to a man like Tesman, whom he despises. But though Tesman is a ninny, he is, as Hedda says, a "specialist"—he is a competent, plodding student of his subject. Lovborg may quite naturally wish to see how his new method, or his excursion into a new field, strikes the average scholar of the Tesman type. He is, in fact, "trying it on the dog"—neither an unreasonable nor an unusual proceeding. There is, no doubt, a certain improbability in the way in which Lovborg is represented as carrying his manuscript around, and especially in Mrs. Elvsted's production of his rough draft from her pocket; but these are mechanical trifles, on which only a niggling criticism would dream of laying stress.

      Of all Ibsen's works, Hedda Gabler is the most detached, the most objective—a character-study pure and simple. It is impossible—or so it seems to me—to extract any sort of general idea from it. One cannot even call it a satire, unless one is prepared to apply that term to the record of a "case" in a work of criminology. Reverting to Dumas's dictum that a play should contain "a painting, a judgment, an ideal," we may say the Hedda Gabler fulfils only the first of these requirements. The poet does not even pass judgment on his heroine: he simply paints her full-length portrait with scientific impassivity. But what a portrait! How searching in insight, how brilliant in colouring, how rich in detail! Grant Allen's remark, above quoted, was, of course, a whimsical exaggeration; the Hedda type is not so common as all that, else the world would quickly come to an end. But particular traits and tendencies of the Hedda type are very common in modern life, and not only among women. Hyperaesthesia lies at the root of her tragedy. With a keenly critical, relentlessly solvent intelligence, she combines a morbid shrinking from all the gross and prosaic detail of the sensual life. She has nothing to take her out of herself—not a single intellectual interest or moral enthusiasm. She cherishes, in a languid way, a petty social ambition; and even that she finds obstructed and baffled. At the same time she learns that another woman has had the courage to love and venture all, where she, in her cowardice, only hankered and refrained. Her malign egoism rises up uncontrolled, and calls to its aid her quick and subtle intellect. She ruins the other woman's happiness, but in doing so incurs a danger from which her sense of personal dignity revolts. Life has no such charm for her that she cares to purchase it at the cost of squalid humiliation and self-contempt. The good and the bad in her alike impel her to have done with it all; and a pistol-shot ends what is surely one of the most poignant character-tragedies in literature. Ibsen's brain never worked at higher pressure than in the conception and adjustment of those "crowded hours" in which Hedda, tangled in the web of Will and Circumstance, struggles on till she is too weary to struggle any more.

      It may not be superfluous to note that the "a" in "Gabler" should be sounded long and full, like the "a" in "Garden"—NOT like the "a" in "gable" or in "gabble."

      W. A.

      FOOTNOTES.

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(A)Letters 214, 216, 217, 219. (B)In the Ibsen volume of Die Literatur (Berlin). (C)Dr. Julius Elias (Neue deutsche Rundschau, December 1906, p. 1462) makes the curious assertion that the character of Thea Elvsted was in part borrowed from this "Gossensasser Hildetypus." It is hard to see how even Gibes' ingenuity could distil from the same flower two such different essences as Thea and Hilda. (D)See article by Herman Bang in Neue deutsche Rundschau, December 1906, p. 1495. (E)Dr. Brahm (Neue deutsche Rundschau, December 1906, P. 1422) says that after the first performance of Hedda Gabler in Berlin Ibsen confided to him that the character had been suggested by a German lady whom he met in Munich, and who did not shoot, but poisoned herself. Nothing more seems to be known of this lady. See, too, an article by Julius Elias in the same magazine, p. 1460.

HEDDA GABLER.

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PLAY IN FOUR ACTS.

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      CHARACTERS.

      GEORGE TESMAN.*

       HEDDA TESMAN, his wife.

       MISS JULIANA TESMAN, his aunt.

       MRS. ELVSTED.

       JUDGE** BRACK.

       EILERT LOVBORG.

       BERTA, servant at the Tesmans.

       *Tesman, whose Christian name in the original is "Jorgen," is

       described as "stipendiat i kulturhistorie"—that is to say, the

       holder of a scholarship for purposes of research into the History

       of Civilisation.

       **In the original "Assessor."

      The scene of the action is Tesman's villa, in the west end

       of Christiania.

ACT FIRST.

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      A spacious, handsome, and tastefully furnished drawing room,

       decorated in dark colours. In the back, a wide doorway with

       curtains drawn back, leading into a smaller room decorated

       in the same style as the drawing-room. In the right-hand

       wall of the front room, a folding door leading out to the

       hall. In the opposite wall, on the left, a glass door, also

       with curtains drawn back. Through the panes can be seen

       part of a verandah outside, and trees covered with autumn

       foliage. An oval table, with a cover on it, and surrounded

       by chairs, stands well forward. In front, by the wall on

       the right, a wide stove of dark porcelain, a high-backed

       arm-chair, a cushioned foot-rest, and two footstools. A

       settee, with a small round table in front of it, fills the

       upper right-hand corner. In front, on the left, a little

       way from the wall, a sofa. Further back than the glass

       door, a piano. On either side of СКАЧАТЬ