Hedda Gabler- Crescendo of the Age:19th Century Society

Hedda Gabler is a play written by Henrik Ibsen during 19th century Norway. This time period is known as the Victorian era which is largely characterized for its peace, prosperity and social reform. We find elements of the Victorian Era throughout Ibsen’s play in various forms ranging from human rights to economic peculiarities. Firstly, through plot development, it is apparent that Judge Brak and Hedda Gabler are the only members that belong to the aristocrat social class while the other members are upstarts that have gained their membership through other means. Notably, we witness Berta commenting “I should never have dreamt in those days that she and Master George would make a match of it.” In other words, Berta is surprised that two individuals from different social classes have married in such unlikely circumstances. Furthermore, we find Miss Tesman trying to fit within her new found status by purchasing a hat. This attempt utterly fails as Hedda mistakes it for a maid’s garment. Miss Tesman’s unfamiliarity and discomfort with her position only serves to emphasize the ascendancy of the middle class. Hence, we find the theme new money versus old money where previous upper class members find their world dissipating by the membership of the middle class.

Compared to the previous century, gender roles in society remained largely unchanged. There was still a large belief for a patriarchal system within households and the government. A monarch was still in place, only to be impeached in the late 19th century, with the aristocrats controlling economic and political elements throughout the country. Although the Victorian Era was a time of large reform, women’s roles were restricted to household duties and intermediaries of wealth through marriage. In Hedda Gabler, we find Hedda struggling against Victorian standards by her burning passion to find purpose for her life only to fail since society did not teach, and provide her with the necessary resources to do so. Additionally, Tesman’s membership to high society can be mainly attributed to Hedda accepting his hand in marriage thus signifying women’s roles as contracts of wealth. Furthermore, Hedda’s dilemma can also be attributed to the lack of economic mobility women faced. Her material wealth disappeared when she married Tesman thus showing that women had no control over property at the time. On another note, men’s roles in Victorian society was largely defined around the material success they achieved outside of the house. We notice throughout the play that Tesman is ecstatic about his career opportunity but rather jealous of Lovborg. This is shown when Tesman seems to take a subtle joy in the destruction of Lovborg’s “child.” After all, Lovborg achieved recognition by publishing a highly recognized yet controversial book while Tesman safely continues on with his research. Therefore, this jealous is mainly attributed to how society deemed men worthy and the characteristics men attributed themselves to when it came to self-worth.

In conclusion, the Victorian Era was a time where economic changes vastly swept over the country. We see in Hedda Gabler that the middle class are now flooding what use to be an exclusionary society. Despite the economic changes, male and female roles were largely unchanged but strictly defined. For one, males were responsible for bringing in and controlling wealth ,and pursuing worthy jobs.  The female role was mainly within the household with little to no opportunity for mobility in society. They were largely expected to take care of all household duties and retain an essence of purity, hence the impact of a sexual scandal. In summation, the play revolves around characters strictly adhering to Victorian social standards with only a few representing the oppressive and restrictive nature the standards carry.

The Role and Character of Judge Brack

             Brack is a judge of relatively inferior rank.  He is a friend of both Tesman and Hedda, and he visits their house regularly. He has connections around the city, and is often the first to give Tesman information about alterations in the possibility of his professorship. He seems to enjoy meddling in other people's affairs. He is a worldly and cynical man. On certain occasions he seems to represent the whole society of the time, his opportunism, meanness, and blackmailing and lusty love aspiration make him an epitome of society.

Brack strikes as a very immoral man from the very beginning, due to the aplenty advances he made towards Hedda. He had always subtlety hinted that he thought that Hedda might like “a new responsibility” and most importantly, that he will “fight for the end, for the “triangle” to be “fortified and defended by mutual consent.”

To flirt with an unwed lady is one thing. But to be thoroughly suggestive of certain immoral acts to a legally wed lady would seem to be a moral crime. A crime, which would deem Brack as an immoral judge, which is juxtaposition in the phrase itself. The depraved misdeed was too much to expect from a judge, much less to say the way that he had insinuated himself into the household of a married couple.

Brack’s manipulative nature can perhaps be considered the most powerful tool that he has, to be able to control people at his beck and call. The way he withholds his information, only to disseminate it at an ‘appropriate’ time, when it will hit the victim the hardest, shows how well he can play the psychological game. He was apparently so good at calculating his steps that he was able to have Hedda exclaim with pain that she is “in your powers, Mr. Brack. From now on, I’m at your mercy.” He played his last hand of  the pack very well, henceforth gaining control over Hedda almost at once, after we have seen her authoritative throughout the plot. The unexpected twist of events, definitely illustrates an element of surprise for the reader.

Nothing much can be mentioned or commented about Brack, except that he seems to be a guru at the game at which both he and Hedda seemed to be indulged in. His callous ways together with his tricky language have caused the one all mighty Hedda to fall prey to him, exposing the extent of his scheming nature to the reader. It certainly allows the reader to realize his true nature and to confirm the suspicions of Brack’s ulterior motives.

The presence of Brack alone is enough to allow Tesman appear trivial and ridiculous. His language as compared to Tesman seemed to have many underlying meanings, while Tesman’s, for an academic, seems rather superficial. Tesman, being a worrywart, starts to fret like a young lady when informed that his appointment might not come. He “clasps his hands together” and “flings his arms about” asking his “dearest Hedda, how can you (she) take it all so calmly.” Brack on the other hand, being the surely and confident self tries to comfort him by telling him that he will “most probably get it” but “only after a bit of competition”. Brack’s calm composure and surely words certainly outweigh Tesman’s unnecessary gestures and fretful language.

The vulnerability of Tesman and Hedda’s marriage has also clearly been brought out by the intrusion of Brack. The fact that Hedda would “clasp her hand at the back of her neck, lean back in the chair and look at him” indicates how comfortable she feels with Brack. The stichomythia in their speeches also brings out the level of intimacy the both of them share as seen by the quote “ Brack: A trusted and sympathetic friend… Hedda: …who can converse on all manners of lively topics… Brack:… and who’s not in the least academic” It shows how well they complement each other, finishing  each other’s thoughts as though they were in a relationship themselves. As Hedda could easily pour out her woes to a man other than her husband gives an indication of how sterile her marriage with Tesman was. So unfruitful that they had absolutely no proper communications between husband and wife that Hedda was glad to have a friend who could converse with her.

Psychoanalysis of the Play Hedda Gabler

Hedda Gabler is a play about frustration and despair in an individual by a conventionalized society. However, we cannot be sure that Ibsen deliberately propagates the freudain theory. The play was written by Ibsen at the same time when Freud was just beginning to publish his theories. The question remains , " who influenced whom?"

Freud propagates the same idea as Ibsen's realization of certain ideas including repression, paranoia, Oedipus' complex, phallic symbols and so on. The question remains, whether Ibsen had caught the wind of Freud's work and utilized in his works or it was Ibsen who provoked Freud to develop his theories.

Hedda Gabler is the psychological study of a well-groomed, cultured and ambitious woman. Two factors affect Hedda's behavoiur in the course of the play. One is her environment, the middle class atmosphere where she breaths difficult. The other is her pregnant condition, which she finds unbearable and reacts at the idea. She is spiritually poor that generates boredom that compels her to destroy others beautifully and finally, her own self.

Hedda is a child of her particular past, brought up in the military fashion. She is unable to accommodate with the changing trends of the middle class society. She yearns for freedom and at the same time, she is afraid of her scandal with Loevberg.  She displays repulsive behavior at Brack's illusion to her pregnancy. She reacts saying, " Be quite! Nothing of that sort will ever happen..No responsibility for me".

Reasons for frustration in Hedda's life is not sexuality. Her compliance with the idea that she has to confirm submission and dependence in physical and social terms drive her mad. She wants to remain in the limelight. Ibsen puts in , " She really wants to live the whole life of a man". She had been imparted manners more befitting to a boy than a girl. It also reminds of Freud's concept of woman.

Hedda's craze for pistols and her association with them links to Freudian phallic symbol. She shares her sorrows with them, playing at the time when the time is nothing soothing. As a symbol, pistols ensures her defence against the male dominated society. She keeps "Power" over others with pistols in her hands.

Despite her every effort to supersede the male sex, she remains a woman after all. A repression against her sex and the society reside in her inner self. She dwells a hatred for the things she doesn’t need to be in the surrounding. She remains jealous of the revival of relation between Thea and Loevberg. His remarks that the new book is the child of his union with Thea, nourishes her hatred to extreme and fabricates the situation and burns the manuscript. She says, " I am burnig you child Thea!... I am  burning your child". She not only burns Thea's child, but in the wider context, her own prospect of being a mother. She fails to drive Loeverg according to her own wishes and burns at the sight of Tesman coordinating with the inferior woman with curly hair.

Hedda , in the end of the play, is left with no option to exercise power. Loevberg dies, Tesman is gravitating towards Thea and the fear of becoming a mother appalls her. She has nothing left for her except the role of a mother and a mistress. Brack wants to develop sexual intimacy with her by blackmailing. The only way left to end all fuss "Beautifully" was to embrace the blow of the much loved pistols, she does so.

Ibsen has artistically created psychologically developed characters. We find pre-defined behaviors of the characters if we analyze them by applying Freudian's theories. Psychoanalysis provides critical view of a character for the analysis to the reader and the audience. The thought patterns can be investigated and predicted in attempt to compare Ibsen's ideas with Freud's theories. 

Hedda Gabler as a Social Parable

It has been much debated that Hedda Gabler is drama focused on an individual psyche. It is merely a character study and boasts no claim to present social theme. If we have an analysis of the play, we would be able to find out that Ibsen has successfully corresponded with the popular social issues of his times in the texture of the story.

In the very beginning of the play, Hedda is commented on by Miss Tesman saying, "What a life she had in General Gabler's days!". The whole of the Victorian aristocracy is taken into account by Ibsen in exposing the character of Hedda. She makes sarcastic remarks at her first appearance. She objects to the new hat of Aunt Juju and later passes snobbish remarks on hand-made slippers presented to Tesman.  She seems to abhor everything associated with Tesman, including his relations and the class to which he belongs. She demands the finest for her.

Hedda's decision to get married to Tesman is nothing but to secure her age, and to avoid material decline as General Gabler left nothing significant after his death. She confessed to Judge,  " I really had danced myself out, Judge.My time was up". Her confession with the phrase that her time was up offers social values as women must marry as they are not venerated as spinsters.

She only decides to marry Tesman in hope that he would make his mark and earn the luxuries she had been born with, but in spite of having a happy time with true sense of love, she gets 'trapped in the marriage of convenience'. She even reacts at the idea of becoming a mother, as she hates to gain weight and lose her lovely womanly figure. She expresses the fear of becoming a mother saying, "I have no talent for such things, Judge. I won't have responsibilities" Through the persona of Hedda, the hypocrisies of the upper societies are meant to be exposed and Ibsen did his best.

She seeks to push her husband, a scholarly figure, into politics, as she would be able to raise her social status and allow herself to have "Power" over others. Role of power in the nineteenth century was an attribute of men, and women were submissive, static, passive and pure. She plays with her guns, rides and manipulate the live of the people as the men of status used to do in those days. The society of Hedda displays tolerance of her masculine behavior in the age when it seemed most inappropriate.

Her attitude of confining the act of suicide as " Beautiful" is equally significant. She convinces Loevberg to attempt suicide, but it must be done beautifully. He shoots himself in the stomach in a brothel, not as beautiful as she intended. She even puts an end to her life beautifully as she had fantasized.

Her conversation with Thea also shows the social morals values of the time. When she learns that Thea  has left her husband to search Loevberg, she disapproves saying, "but my dearest girl, that you could dare to do such a thing!". Her resentment was about disparaging social values for one's own choice. Even the suicide at the end of the play is an attempt to escape the scandal that might expose her character. Judge Brack warns her after the death of Loevberg that if the counsel were to discover that the pistol was hers, there would be a scandal. "a scandal, yes—the kind you're so deathly afraid of". She comprehends the message of blackmailing by Brack  and realizes that she is no longer free. She fears the scandal and the disobedience with the society gender's role lead her to kill herself, to free herself. She contributes to her own end and the root of her compliance with her decision is her former life and affairs.

The title of the play also refers to the theme of the play symbolically. It refers to the name of Hedda in her formal self, Hedda Gabler, the daughter of General Gabler. The play is about her aristocratic self and her inability to accommodate in bourgeois life in to which she is married. Ibsen tries to show importance of her social class by employing her maiden name. Hedda prefers to be identified as the daughter of General Gabler rather than the wife of George Tesman. She, in the course of the play, detects the life style of her husband and his class and remained clung to her honourable past.

Considering the different aspects of the social parables, it can be argued that the theme of Hedda Gabler centers on social issues.

A Critique of the Character of Hedda Gabler

The character of Hedda Gabler is contrived in the back drop of 19^th century Norwegian Society. Hedda, raised by a military father, is designated as the protagonist of the drama, manifesting an amalgam of feminine and masculine traits nurtured under General Gabler’s unique upbringing and the societal mores encroached upon her. Her identity is greatly appropriated with her father’s exalted social stature. Hedda Gabler is a pampered child who, by the dint of her father’s venerated social persona, wants to occupy an influential place in society. She aloof and insolent towards the people of low rank. She is a class conscious lady who is supposed to exercise her power over others.

Owing to her military back ground, she must have been grown up in an atmosphere of strict discipline and conformity to rules and would have inherited her father’s stature which ultimately makes her class conscious, uncouth and disparaging for others. She was trained to shoot and ride.  She stands apart from and well above all except a few of the other young women of her time. Hedda’s distance from other, her aloofness, her pride and the indelibility of her identity as a Gabler, all derive from this social eminence. For Joseph Wood Krutch, Hedda Gabler is an evil woman. However, naturalistic studies explain her behavior in terms of the restrictive social conditions of nineteenth century Norway. Hedda Gabler is a stranger to herself, however, lacking dare and defiance of conventions, she is unable to undergo the trials of self-evaluation and becomes a morbidly self-vindictive, destructive virago, capable only to strike out against the successful socially conforming individuals who represent an implicit reproach to her uninformed cravings. In the play, Ibsen provides enough information to show how Hedda's problem is the product of her special background.

Hedda cannot simply defy the convention of female domesticity to pursue her own desires, precisely because she is Hedda Gabler—the daughter of a general, and thus committed to uphold the social codes that simultaneously elevate and constrain her. Thus, to be the General’s daughter is a two-edged sword for Hedda: it confers on her the spiritual pride and self-regard that set her apart from the common herd; but it also requires her absolute conformity to the rules of propriety that she finds so stifling.

Being beautiful and the most “sought-after” young woman, she attended many social affairs but never found anyone to marry; probably she was not rich enough to interest the eligible bachelors of high social standing. She marries Tesman as she was running out of her age. As she confesses to Brack, “ I have danced out my days.” General Gabler’s daughter, she is tied to societal norms and dares not risk a fight with society and do something as unconventional as marrying a dissipated rake like Loevborg, even though she is fascinated by him. Instead she marries Tesman, who represents stolidity and respectability.

She desires conformity and even lacks financial assistance. A life of conformity without faith leads her to boredom and emotional sterility. All her dreams end in her boredom and frustration as her marriage of convenience brings about the hard realities of life of a middle class family. She never had the tendency to be ruled over or let anyone exercise 'Power' over her. She orchestrates the whole play with her genius although she fails to adopt any of the role as a wife, caregiver or a house keeper. She attempts to manipulate people like Thea and Loevborg and drives them to destruction to satisfy her own unattended ego. When Judge Brack tries to develop his relation with her and blackmails her, she felt lonely and quits.

She remains the daughter of General Gabler rather than the wife of Tesman. The portrait of G.Gabler in the room and Piano symbolizes her proximity with her past. She adopts the attitude of frost formality with aunts of the Tesman and doesn’t miss a single event to convey sarcastic remarks. Even the death of Aunt Rena exercises no influence over her. She rightly confesses to Judge Brack, "These impulses come over me all of a sudden and I cannot resist them" She is cruel and mean to Aunt Julia and Mrs. Elvsted and contracts an underhanded alliance with Brack. When Loevborg comes back into her life she tries to liberate him but fails, and in a fit of jealousy, she burns his manuscripts. She also gives him one of her pistols to commit suicide, begging him to “do it beautifully.” However, when she comes to know that he did not shoot himself in the temple, but was killed in a scuffle and shot in the bowels. She is disillusioned finding that she is completely in Brack’s power and fearing a scandal; she finally has the courage to shoot herself in the temple. Drama