past events.
Hedda Gabler was another innovative experiment for Ibsen. Instead of
presenting a merely social problem, he painted a psychological
portrait of a fascinating and self-destructive woman.
Hedda Gabler has many striking resemblances to A Doll's House, even
though it appeared eleven years later, in 1890. In both plays, the
action takes place in the drawing room. The characters include a
husband and, wife, the husband's friend (who completes a romantic
triangle), an old school friend of the wife's, and this friend's
love interest. Both wives are in a psychological crisis: Nora is not
in touch with her aggressive or "male" side, while Hedda cannot bear
her own femaleness. (It's interesting to note that Ibsen wrote these
plays before Freud expressed his idea that everyone has both male
and female components.) Nora, a member of the middle class, deals
constructively with her search for self-knowledge. Her final closing
of the door at the end of the play signifies that she is going out
into the world, which is full of possibilities. On the other hand,
Hedda Gabler, a member of the dying aristocracy, becomes destructive
and predatory. Her final action is suicide.
Despite his success, Ibsen was never satisfied with his work. He
felt his major characters had all failed to achieve something
important, something dramatic--and he felt the same way about
himself. He was in his sixties when he wrote Hedda Gabler and it
signaled another change in his life and writing.
In 1891, after twenty-seven years of exile, Ibsen moved back to his
native Norway and into his third phase of plays, called his
Symbolist Period. The main characters in these plays aren't women,
but spiritually defeated old men.
Ibsen had a stroke in 1900 from which he never completely recovered.
But he remained an opposing force to the end. In 1906, as he was
coming out of a coma, the nurse commented to his wife that he seemed
a little better. "On the contrary!" Ibsen snapped. He died a few
days later.
A DOLL'S HOUSE: THE PLAY
(The following edition was used in the preparation of this guide:
Henrik Ibsen, Four Major Plays, Vol. I, trans. by Rolf Fjelde,
Signet Classic, 1965.)
A DOLL'S HOUSE: THE PLOT
It's Christmas Eve. Nora Helmer, a beautiful young wife, has been
