Study Guide: Hedda Gabler

STUDY GUIDE

BY HENRIK IBSEN A NEW ADAPTATION BY JON ROBIN BAITZ DIRECTED BY JENNIFER TARVER

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Study Guide Objectives

This study guide serves as a classroom tool for teachers and students, and addresses the following Common Core standards:

English Language Arts • Reading Literature: Key Ideas and Details 3. Analyze how complex characters (e.g. those with multiple or conflicting motivations) develop over the course of a text, interact with other characters, and advance the plot or develop the themes (Grades 9-10). Analyze the impact of the author’s choices regarding how to develop related elements of a story or drama (e.g., where a story is set, how the action is ordered, how the characters are introduced and developed) (Grades 11-12).

• Reading Literature: Craft and Structure 5. Analyze how an author’s choices concerning how to structure a text, order events within it (e.g., parallel plots), and manipulate time (e.g., pacing, flashbacks) create such effects as mystery, tension, or surprise (Grades 9-10). Analyze how an author’s choices concerning how to structure specific parts of a text (e.g., the choice of where to begin or end a story, the choice to provide a comedic or tragic resolution) contribute to its overall structure and meaning as well as its aesthetic impact (Grades 11-12).

• Reading Literature: Craft and Structure 6. Analyze a particular point of view or cultural experience reflected in a work of literature from outside the United States, drawing on a wide reading of world literature (Grades 9-10). Analyze a case in which grasping point of view required distinguishing what is directly stated in a text from what is really meant (e.g., satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement) (Grades 11-12).

• Reading Literature: Integration of Knowledge and Ideas 7. Analyze multiple interpretations of a story, drama, or poem (e.g. recorded or live production of a play or recorded novel or poetry), evaluating how each version interprets the source text (Include at least one play by Shakespeare and one play by an American dramatist.)

(Grades 9-12).

Theatre • 5: Researching and Interpreting. Students will research, evaluate and apply cultural and historical information to make artistic choices.

• 6: Connections. Students will make connections between theatre, other disciplines and daily life.

• 7: Analysis, Criticism and Meaning. Students will analyze, critique, and construct meanings from works of theatre.

Guidelines for Attending the Theatre • Attending live theatre is a unique experience with many valuable educational and social benefits. To ensure that all audience members are able to enjoy the performance, please take a few minutes to discuss the following audience etiquette topics with your students before you come to Hartford Stage.

• How is attending the theatre similar to and different from going to the movies? What behaviors are and are not appropriate when seeing a play? Why? • Remind students that because the performance is live, the audience can affect what kind of performance the actors give. No two audiences are exactly the same and no two performances are exactly the same—this is part of what makes theatre so special! Students’ behavior should reflect the level of performance they wish to see.

• Theatre should be an enjoyable experience for the audience. It is absolutely all right to applaud when appropriate and laugh at the funny moments. Talking and calling out during the performance, however, are not allowed. Why might this be?

• Be sure to mention that not only would the people seated around them be able to hear their conversation, but the actors on stage could hear them, too. Theatres are constructed to carry sound efficiently!

• Any noise or light can be a distraction, so please remind students to make sure their cell phones are turned off (or better yet, left at home or at school!). Texting, photography, and video recording are prohibited. Food and gum should not be taken into the theatre.

• Students should sit with their group as seated by the Front of House staff and should not leave their seats once the performance has begun. If possible, restrooms should be used only during intermission.

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The Playwright—Henrik Ibsen

Henrik Ibsen was born on March 20, 1828, in Skien, Norway, to Knud Ibsen, a merchant, and Marichen Altenburg.

Young Henrik’s creative leanings were apparent early on, and his mother, who enjoyed visual art and theatre, encouraged her son’s interest in painting. While Knud was, for many years, a successful businessman, he suffered several economic setbacks when Henrik was a young teenager. Knud went bankrupt and the comfortably established Ibsen family was suddenly sent into poverty. Henrik, the oldest of five children, left home and became an apprentice to an apothecary in the town of Grimstad at 15. While living and working in Grimstad, Henrik made his first serious forays into creative writing, penning several poems and his first play, Catiline. He also fathered an illegitimate child during this time with whom he would have no contact, though he sent financial support to the child’s mother for many years.

In 1850, Henrik Ibsen moved to the Norwegian capital of Christiania with the intent of studying medicine at Christiania University, but failed the required entrance exams. He then shifted his focus to writing full-time. After a brief stint in journalism, Ibsen was made playwrightin-residence at the Norwegian Theatre in Bergen, where he wrote, directed, and produced. His time there was a significant theatrical learning experience and allowed him to apply his new understanding of the theatre profession to his writing. Given that Norway had little in terms of dramatic literary heritage (most plays produced at the time were translations of French and German works), Ibsen’s early plays were considered somewhat awkward and largely unsuccessful. During his six years in Bergen, he also met Suzannah Thoresen, who he would marry in 1858 (their son, Sigurd, was born in 1859).

Throughout their marriage, Suzannah devoted herself to supporting her husband’s career.

In 1857, Ibsen returned to Christiania where he became Artistic Director of the Norwegian Theatre; his financially troubled tenure concluded with the theatre’s bankruptcy in 1862. Next, he took a position as a literary consultant at the Christiania Theatre. The theatre’s production of his play, The Pretenders, was poorly received. Ibsen relocated to Sorrento, Italy, in 1864 and spent the next 27 years living abroad, largely

in Rome, Dresden, and Munich.

These were also his most productive years, during which he wrote many of his bestknown plays, including B r a n d (1866), Peer Gynt (1867), Henrik Ibsen c. 1878. Photo by Franz HanfA Doll’s staengel.

House (1879), Ghosts (1881), An Enemy of the People (1882), The Wild Duck (1884), The Lady from the Sea (1888), and Hedda Gabler (1890), and published a book of poetry, simply titled Poems, in 1871. Leaving his native land was both a physical and stylistic departure for Ibsen.

He transitioned from attempted imitations of the melodramas and conventional well-made plays with which he was most familiar and began penning philosophically infused works that featured satire and sharp criticism of Norwegian society. Productions of his plays were rarely seen but heavily debated internationally because they broke the mold of what was considered acceptable drama (see “The Father of Modern Drama” on page 4) and were frequently censored and even banned (the London ban on Ghosts lasted 23 years). Major companies refused to produce his plays, but there were, small theatres in Berlin, Paris, and London that were dedicated specifically to Ibsen’s work. The alienation and “otherness” that Ibsen’s work depicted were familiar to artists and audiences who considered themselves outsiders to the politics and culture of modern society. Despite the small theatres’ dedication and his international fame, Ibsen met little financial success as a playwright.

Ibsen returned to Norway in 1891 on what was supposed to be a temporary visit, but friends convinced him to stay in Christiania. He continued to write until he suffered the first of several strokes in 1900. Henrik Ibsen died on May 23, 1906.

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The Father of Modern Drama

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Realism is a dramatic genre crafted to resemble everyday existence. It attempts to portray stories that reflect observable realities of modern life, including characters’ relationships and behaviors, costumes, and settings. Within these identifiable realities, Realism explores issues of perceived and actual alienation, pressure to conform to societal expectations and suppress individuality, and the constraints modern life places on living heroically.

During the late 19th century, popular theatre primarily featured melodramas (suspenseful depictions of heroic battles between good and evil) and well-made plays with inoffensive, predictable plot progressions and contrived happy endings. To Ibsen, these plays presented a reassuring view of society that glazed over all matters of uncertainty and moral ambiguity. Early in his career as a playwright, Ibsen tried to emulate these depictions but soon rejected them in favor of focusing on their inauthenticity. Through his plays, Ibsen sought to reveal much of modern life as an absurd construct that suppresses people’s true selves, and to explore the tension between the social self (the persona that must be cultivated and presented to the world) and the essential self (the truth of who a person is and what they want).

From his early attempts at poetry through his most famous later plays, Ibsen’s writing is marked by a uniquely modern affinity for rebels and outsiders (his first poems, written in the late 1840s and early 1850s, were inspired by revolutions throughout Europe).

In Ibsen’s Realistic plays, characters experiencing the tension between their social and essential selves suffer intense feelings of alienation and “otherness,” qualities that characterize his entire body of work.

Ibsen believed that drama should present life as it is, not how people wish it to be, which meant realistically depicting contradictions, injustices, and hypocrisy.

Ibsen’s plays also feature lengthy passages of stage directions full of descriptive details about the intended setting. These passages do much more than provide information about the realistic, recognizable places where the plays occur. They are carefully and deliberately crafted to help shape plots and reveal layers of metaphor; as a result, the scenery in an Ibsen play functions as an additional

character on stage. This is especially true of Ibsen’s later works, such as A Doll’s House and Hedda Gabler, which feature characters rebelling against their environments. For example, Hedda Gabler’s opening stage directions describe “a large drawing room” in which “bunches of flowers are everywhere. Too many—as though they had accumulated over the past day or so and reached a saturation point.” Just as she feels oppressed by her new domestic responsibilities, Hedda is overwhelmed by the scent of the flowers when she first enters and remarks that the verandah door should be left open. “Well, that we need,” she says. “These flowers are all very—pungent—aren’t they?” (Act I).

Ibsen is often called the “Father of Modern Drama” because he wrote thought-provoking plays that grappled with issues of alienation which—while common dramatic subject matter today—were quite taboo at the time. His use of realistic settings to create and develop metaphor made him a pioneer in the art and craft of playwriting. His groundbreaking exploration of the psychological development of characters created a new dramatic genre that serves as the template for many of today’s most popular writers.

Henrik Ibsen c. 1898.

Themes for Discussion Manipulation and Control

In Henrik Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler, a woman arrives in a new home she does not want with a new husband who bores her and a new family who she finds quaint and unappealing. She is surrounded by men who intend for her to live by their terms, leaving her with a profound sense of entrapment. Hedda’s intellect is misaligned with her surroundings and she struggles to find an outlet for her need for drama and excitement. She is stifled by the expectations of hearth and home that were pressed upon 19th century wives and her disgust with her situation reveals itself through her enjoyment of subtly manipulating and controlling those around her.

In Act I, Hedda’s manipulative impulses are revealed almost immediately following her entrance into the drawing room where her husband, George, is talking with his Aunt Julia. Hedda’s conversation with Aunt Julia is pleasant on the surface, but Hedda, determined to make Aunt Julia leave and to take control over her new surroundings, employs passiveaggressive tactics that reveal her darker impulses.

Hedda begins by correcting Aunt Julia’s attempt to be helpful by closing the verandah door following Hedda’s complaint about it being left open. She follows this with a subtle insult to Aunt Julia’s hat by pretending to think it belongs to Berta, the maid: HEDDA: George, this maid isn’t going to work . . . Look. She’s left her old hat just sitting out on a chair . . . What if someone came in and saw this?

TESMAN: But Hedda—it’s Aunt Julia’s hat!

HEDDA: Is it? It is? Oh. MISS TESMAN: Yes, and it’s brand-new, Hedda.

(Act I) Hedda derives some pleasure from inflicting this slight. “Miss Tesman had dropped her hat on that chair this morning,” she confides to Judge Brack in Act II with what Ibsen describes as a “rueful smile.”

She goes on: “I sort of pretended I thought it was the maid’s.” When Brack wonders why she “would want to hurt that nice old lady,” Hedda admits that it is a compulsion she finds impossible to resist: “I can’t help it. Something comes over me and I can’t stop myself” (Act II).

After Hedda successfully prompts Aunt Julia’s departure, the Tesmans are soon joined by another visitor, Mrs. Thea Elvsted, who is seeking help finding their mutual friend, Eilert Lovborg.

Mrs. Elvsted’s arrival presents an opportunity for Hedda, whose interest in Lovborg’s whereabouts is more than a simple concern for the well-being of an old friend. Knowing that she will never get the full truth from Mrs. Elvsted with Tesman present, Hedda concocts an excuse for her husband to leave the room. “Tesman. You should write to [Lovborg], I think,” she suggests. “Give him an opening . . . And actually, you would want to do it as soon as possible.

Right now, really” (Act I). When Tesman exits to write the letter, Hedda knows that it will be simple to manipulate Mrs. Elvsted into telling her more.

She and Mrs. Elvsted knew each other as young girls at school, where Hedda was a dominant presence who genuinely terrified Mrs. Elvsted. “You used to pull my hair whenever we met on the stairs,” Mrs. Elvsted recalls. “And once you threatened to burn it all off” (Act I). Hedda appears to react incredulously, trying to build a false sense of trust so Mrs. Elvsted will reveal more information about Lovborg. “I did?

Really? No . . . Oh, come now. That was just girls being silly,” she explains, beginning to reshape the narrative of the past for her own purposes. “Back in those days we were very close” (Act I).

But Hedda’s denial that she has deliberately intimidated Mrs. Elvsted is part of a pattern of behavior she exhibits throughout the play. In Act II, when Eilert Lovborg appears at the Tesmans’ home, Hedda is confused by his demeanor. He is no longer the man “with vine leaves in his hair” through whom she received “a little peek in at a world which—Which she [was] not permitted to know anything about at all” (Act II). When Lovborg cites Mrs. Elvsted as an instrumental force in his transformation from scandalized drunk to sober scholar, Hedda knows her days of living vicariously through him are over—unless, that is, she can return him to his true self. Hedda begins her manipulation of Lovborg by suggesting that he have a drink, knowing that should he succumb to pressure, he will not be able to stop his self-destructive behavior. “Seriously, Mr. Lovborg,” she taunts in Act II, “I do think you should 5

have a little tiny wee drink, just for your own sake . . . Otherwise Mean Girls: 1) Girls who are bullies and use people will think that deep down you don’t trust yourself. And are “girl aggression” (nasty comments, trickery, really actually afraid . . . I saw it so deceit, excluding people from events, spreading clearly in Judge Brack just now.” rumors, stealing boyfriends, etc.) to manipulate Hedda further ensures that she has complete control over Lovborg other girls . . . These girls are often popular by undermining his connection because everyone is either afraid of them or with Mrs. Elvsted. Hedda paints wants to be like them. They tend to have armies Mrs. Elvsted as weak, particularly when it comes to Lovborg’s ability of followers (“friends”/wannabees) comprising to control himself. “Strong as their clique. However, few people actually like a rock,” Hedda remarks when Lovborg declines to attend Judge them for who they are.

Brack’s party. “An unshakable will. True to your word. Exactly UrbanDictionary.com how a man should be.” She then turns to Mrs. Elvsted: “Isn’t that what I told you when you came to us this morning Privately, Lovborg confesses his lie to Hedda. The so hysterically . . . See? There’s absolutely no need book bound Mrs. Elvsted to the abstemious version to live in terror that he’s going to” be self-destructive of Lovborg, but having both lost control of himself (Act II). This pushes Lovborg over the edge. When and misplaced the book the night before, Lovborg he drinks a toast to Mrs. Elvsted’s health, Mrs. Elvsted concludes that he does not “have the strength for that understands that Hedda has deliberately manipulated kind of life either . . . [Mrs. Elvsted] actually managed the situation. “Oh, Hedda. How could you do this?” to break [his] courage, and spirit” (Act III). Hedda’s she asks. While Hedda initially plays innocent, she resentment of Mrs. Elvsted’s influence on Lovborg privately admits to Mrs. Elvsted precisely why she rises to the surface. “Imagine it,” she says, “That silly caused it to happen. “I can see him now. With vine little fool could control someone’s destiny” (Act III). leaves in his hair,” she imagines. “Glorious and But though she goes on to describe Lovborg’s choice proud and glowing . . . For once in my life, I would to lie to Mrs. Elvsted as cruel, Hedda maintains her like to have some power over someone’s destiny . . . secret knowledge. She exerts her own type of cruelty You know, I think I’ll burn your hair off after all” (Act to shape the situation by withholding Lovborg’s book II). and providing him with the means to create what she

In Act III, the results of Hedda’s manipulation sees as a “courageous,” “glorious” end to his life. are unmistakable. Tesman reveals that he acquired But Hedda is not finished. Once she has Lovborg’s masterpiece manuscript, created with manipulated Lovborg’s connection with Mrs. Elvsted Mrs. Elvsted’s support, when an inebriated Lovborg into destruction, she ensures the outcome she has carelessly dropped it in the street. Hedda takes the engineered is absolute by inflicting a final cruelty manuscript, telling Tesman she will tuck it away upon Mrs. Elvsted: for safe keeping, but she really has more nefarious HEDDA: Now I’m burning your child, Thea!

(She tosses the first few pages into the stove.) motives driving her. When Lovborg arrives at the You with your gorgeous hair. Yes! You and Tesmans’ home, Hedda stays quiet as he lies to Mrs. Elvsted about the manuscript’s whereabouts. He Eilert’s child! (More pages go into the fire.)

I’m burning it! I’m burning the child! (She tells her they can never see each other again because he has “torn [the manuscript] into a thousand and throws the remainder of the manuscript pages one pieces. And tossed them away into the fjord” into the fire.)

(Act III). Mrs. Elvsted is devastated. “Do you know, Eilert—what you’ve done with the book—it’s like Questions: you’ve killed a little child,” she laments (Act III).

• Who holds more power in their relationship, 6

Hedda or Tesman?

• Hedda easily manipulates Tesman into doing things she wants him to do and drives Lovborg to self-destructive behaviors. Why is she not able to manipulate Judge Brack in the same way?

• Consider Hedda’s actions towards Mrs. Elvsted and Eilert Lovborg, as well as the way various characters describe Hedda’s personality, reputation, and lifestyle prior to marrying George Tesman. Is Hedda Gabler a “mean girl?” Why or why not?

Freedom and Self-Fulfillment

“Why should I be [happy]? Can you tell me exactly why I should be happy?” Hedda Gabler asks Judge Brack in Act I. Newly married to a man who seems on track for success and living in a home under renovation to suit her tastes, Hedda has everything a young 19th century wife could hope for, yet still feels trapped and utterly unfulfilled. Brack’s suggestion that she should be satisfied because “for one thing, you got the house you always wanted,” is an insult.

Costume Design for Hedda by Fabio Toblini.

She never had any real interest in the home her husband procured for her and now, trapped by her own choices and her society’s expectations, she realizes “how excruciatingly bored [she’s] going to be” (Act I). Hedda Gabler is a woman who lacks the freedom to find self-fulfillment on her own terms.

Judge Brack concludes that Hedda has “never really been stimulated by anything,” nor has she ever “truly—had a real experience” (Act I). But the kinds of things Brack believes could fill the void in Hedda’s life—the supposed joys of hearth and home that form the basis of the Cult of True Womanhood—are the very things responsible for the boredom, emptiness, and intense feelings of entrapment Hedda experiences (see page 14). She has already expressed discomfort with Tesman’s and Aunt Julia’s comments that she has filled out while on her six-month honeymoon and is dismayed by Aunt Julia’s insinuation that motherhood could be on the horizon. Hedda takes immediate offense to Brack’s suggestion that raising children could fill the void in her life: BRACK: What if you’re faced with a much greater . . . responsibility? The biggest responsibility of them all?

(Beat.)

New duties for little Mrs. Hedda.

HEDDA: Oh, shut up! That’s never going to happen—ever!

BRACK: Let’s have this conversation again in about a year. At the most.

HEDDA: I have no instincts for those sorts of demands, Mr. Judge.

BRACK: Maybe you do. Perhaps they’re simply submerged. And should be explored.

I mean—For other women, it’s the greatest joy— HEDDA: I told you to shut up!

(Act I)

Aunt Julia finds fulfillment in caring for invalids. Tesman’s work is his all-encompasing reason for being. Hedda feels that her life needs a purpose but that as a woman, she lacks the freedom to pursue one, so Hedda is baffled when Mrs. Elvsted arrives at the Tesman house claiming to have pursued her purpose by leaving her husband and his children. “I just couldn’t stand it anymore. Being up there, so completely alone for the rest of my life,” Mrs. Elvsted confesses. “I just quietly packed up as little as I could and I walked away.” “Just like that?”

Hedda remarks. “It’s very brave” (Act I). As a woman 7

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who has spent her life as an object of admiration and envy, what others think of Hedda is important to her; she avoids scandal and insists on presenting an image of respectability. Her shock that Mrs. Elvsted has no concern at all for what people may say only intensifies when she learns that Mrs. Elvsted left her family in pursuit of Eilert Lovborg, a man whose work she lives to support and with whom Hedda was once close. When Lovborg arrives in Act II, he gives further credit to his relationship with Mrs. Elvsted. “She . . . has the courage of her convictions . . . Enormous courage. When it comes to me” he says (Act II). Lovborg claims that Mrs. Elvsted’s courage grants her the freedom to live a fulfilling life, while Hedda is held back by her cowardice.

There is a stark difference, however, between Mrs. Elvsted’s and Hedda’s visions of self-fulfillment.

Mrs. Elvsted lives to support Lovborg’s work. Helping him with his book made her feel that she had a purpose.

Hedda, however, could not be more bored by her husband and his research. Tesman lives for his work and believes that once he secures his professorship, he will be able to live a perfectly adequate life with his lovely wife in their impressive home. But when Tesman indicates that he cannot provide her with the lifestyle to which she is accustomed, he signals Hedda’s worst fears. She cannot fill the void with material things and she already knows that she would find no satisfaction in simply being of service to Tesman. “Nothing makes him happier than rooting through old documents in dusty libraries and making endless copies of things . . . But God, what about me?

I’ve been so insanely bored!” she explains to Judge Brack in Act II. Desperate for some sort of excitement, she even proposes that Tesman should enter politics, knowing well that he would be terrible Costume Design for George Tesman by at it and Fabio Toblini.

fail miserably. “But—what satisfaction could you possibly derive from it? If there’s no chance at all of him succeeding?” Brack questions her. “Because I’m bored! Bored! I am so bored!” Hedda declares, further lamenting “the penny-pinching little world [she’s] ended up in. That’s what makes life so ridiculous. So absolutely ludicrous” (Act II).

Hedda’s mourning over her lost potential is only enhanced by Lovborg’s presence. A brilliant academic rival to Tesman and one-time confidant to Hedda, Lovborg used to confess to her all of his illicit activities, thus providing her with a glimpse into a world that she, as an aristocratic young woman, was not permitted to be part of. The Lovborg who arrives at the Tesmans’ however, is a new man—a temperate, focused scholar who abstains from indulgence.

Hedda is disappointed by Lovborg’s lifestyle changes because, in her assessment, he is no longer truly living. But Hedda recognizes that Lovborg’s hold on his sobriety is tenuous at best. After she manipulates him into going with Tesman to Brack’s party in Act II, Hedda explains to Mrs. Elvsted that the experience will restore Lovborg to his true self: “I can see him now. With vine leaves in his hair. Glorious and proud and glowing . . . And then—you’ll see—he’ll have finally reclaimed himself completely. And will always be free!”

Hedda admires Lovborg’s “appetite for life” and believes “that he’s more courageous than most people” (Act III). But when he returns to the Tesman home, he is frantic and distraught over losing the manuscript that he worked so hard on with Mrs. Elvsted’s help. As he descends further and further into self-destruction, Lovborg realizes that by succumbing to temptation and losing his book, he has lost not only his reason for living but Mrs. Elvsted’s, as well. He tells her to return to the family life she sacrificed in order to be with him.

LOVBORG: I no longer have any use for you.

MRS. ELVSTED: No use for me? What are

you telling me? That the work we’re doing—

Don’t you want me to help you work?

LOVBORG: I’m not planning on doing any

more “work.”

MRS. ELVSTED: Then what do I do with myself . . . I won’t leave you. I won’t let you push me away! I have to be by your side when the book comes out . . . I want the joy of seeing you celebrated! And respected! And honored

again! (Beat.) I want that joy!

He claims to have torn up the book because he is a prisoner to his own weakness. “I’ve torn up my life, so why not do the same to my work” (Act III).

Rather than admitting that she is in possession of the book, Hedda allows Lovborg to believe his work is lost and burns the manuscript. When Tesman asks her how she could have done such a thing, Hedda initially gives a submissive wife’s response: HEDDA: I couldn’t bear the notion of anyone eclipsing you. Ever. Is that clear enough?

TESMAN: Hedda! My God. Is this true? Is this—? Yes—? You would? For me? For love?

You would do something like that because you love me? I mean—imagine that!

HEDDA: Well, there’s more. I suppose I should also tell you that we’re going to have— No, no, just ask your Auntie. She’ll explain everything.

(Act IV) Tesman is thrilled by his wife’s claim to have burned the book in service to him and the growing family others alluded to earlier in the play but that she denied. But when Tesman wants to spread the news of the breakthrough in his and Hedda’s relationship, Hedda quickly realizes that she is even more trapped than before. No matter what she does, the freedom and meaning she so desired is more and more unattainable.

HEDDA: Oh, I’ll die. It’s killing me, I’m

telling you—it’s killing me, all this—!

TESMAN: All this what, Hedda—?

HEDDA: All this pointless, endless

absurdity, George.

(Act IV) Hedda finds herself under the power of Judge Brack, as well. He is a confidant to Hedda and her confessions of dissatisfaction with her life as Tesman’s wife. Brack also knows that Hedda not only destroyed the manuscript, but provided Lovborg with the means to achieve the glorious, courageous death she deemed a fitting end for someone whose nature is to live brilliantly, intensely on the edge. “Eilert Lovborg settled up with himself,” she admits in Act IV. “He had the courage to do what had to be done.

To me that is beautiful.” Brack uses his knowledge of Hedda’s role in Lovborg’s death to blackmail her into entering what he repeatedly refers to as a “triangle of availability.”

HEDDA: So in other words: I’m in your

power. From now on.

BRACK: Dearest Hedda—believe me—I never abuse my power.

HEDDA: All the same. I’m in your power.

Dependent on your will. Essentially—your prisoner. Not free! Still! I can’t do it, I just can’t stand it.

BRACK: Realistically—one learns to tolerate the inevitable. Adjusting isn’t really all that hard.

(Act IV)

Adding salt to Hedda’s wounds is the fact that Mrs. Elvsted is not without a purpose for long. Upon learning that Hedda had Lovborg’s manuscript and burned it, Tesman decides to try to reconstruct it and Mrs. Elvsted is uniquely qualified to assist him. “[Lovborg] dictated. I kept the notes,” she says, pulling them out of her handbag (Act IV). Tesman determines to devote himself to reassembling Lovborg’s book and Mrs. Elvsted agrees to “do everything [she] can” to help him (Act IV). She inspired and supported Lovborg when he first wrote his book and now she will do the same for Tesman as he reconstructs it.

Mrs. Elvsted is able to serve Tesman as Hedda never could or would. Mrs. Elvsted has a reason for being, while Hedda is left as “a woman who would rather blow out her brains than submit to hearth and home” (Faludi, vii). “Can’t I be of any use at all?” she asks Tesman as Act IV draws to a close. “No, none at all,” he replies.

Questions: • Why is Mrs. Elvsted able to leave a life she finds unsatisfying, even though society forbids her from doing so? How is her role within her family different from Hedda’s?

• How would Hedda Gabler’s life have been different if she were a man with all the same dreams and ambitions? How does her gender influence her situation and choices?

• Think of yourself 10 years ago. What did you imagine your future would look like? How similar is the person you are now to the person you dreamed you would be? What did you believe was necessary for you to feel fulfilled by your life? Has your definition of self-fulfillment changed over time?

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The Dual Nature of Art (Creation and Destruction)

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Faced with the prospect of unending boredom,

“She’s General Gabler’s daughter! Think what life with him must have been like. Remember Hedda envisions scenarios that could add drama to seeing her riding with him? In that long black her life in the future, all of which involve some form cape, that giant feather in her hat,” Aunt Julia says of destruction for her husband. Upon learning in Act in Act I, recalling the glamorous role Hedda played I that Tesman is in danger of losing the professorship in her youth. All her life, Hedda has embraced the to Eilert Lovborg, Hedda is thrilled. “Just think performance of this intimidating figure, an exciting, Tesman,” she says. “It’ll be sort of like a duel. Won’t romantic object of envy. But as she transitions from it?” Tesman does not share Hedda’s enthusiasm. youth to middle age, Hedda finds that a new role is “I don’t know how you can be so amused by this, expected of her, one that does not allow her to express Hedda,” he exclaims. But Hedda clarifies that she herself as she would like. Embroiled in what Ibsen is not amused per se, but rather “extremely eager to identified as the conflict between the social self and know how it all turns out.” She finds the prospect the essential self, Hedda embarks on both creative of Tesman destroying someone else, or of being and destructive processes in order to live the life she destroyed, extremely attractive. She even briefly imagined. considers pushing

Hedda uses her husband to objects and her enter politics, “It’s better to burn out than to fade away.” environment as agreeing with Judge important tools Brack in Act II when —Hey Hey, My My (Neil Young) in her attempts to he says that Tesman express her essential has “zero aptitude” self. While away for it.

Watching on a six-month honeymoon with her new husband, him fail would at least provide some entertainment, Hedda began to realize that life with Tesman would and if he were to somehow succeed, “he could end not be a continuation of the drama and suspense that up as—say—a cabinet minister in charge of antique defined life in a warrior’s home. Upon returning as chairs or something—or an ambassador” (Act II). a new wife, poised to establish her home in a grand But this is all part of an elaborate fantasy that Hedda house she once claimed to have always wanted to knows will not come true. Hedda does not have the live in, Hedda tries to create a worthy setting. She means, financially nor socially, to create the life she begins by ensuring that there is flattering light in wants. She can do nothing but pretend. As the stage the drawing room, commenting to Aunt Julia that directions that open Act II describe, its current unacceptable glare was created because Hedda enters from the library, a pistol in her “that maid’s left the verandah door open” (Act I). hand. Its twin sits in a case on the writing table.

But Aunt Julia’s attempt to close the door entirely is Hedda walks around the room, taking aim at not suitable either. “No, just the curtains,” Hedda various objects. She looks outside and smiles, corrects. “That’s right. It gives the room a softer pointing the revolver out the French door toward light” (Act I). The scene now set, Hedda tries to something in the garden. utilize her surroundings to express her frustration in Hedda’s ordinary life could not be further from her a dramatic performance of her emotion that is for no thrilling imagination. In reality, she has nothing to one’s benefit but her own. While Tesman sees Aunt shoot at but “the sky. Just the blue sky” (Act II).

Julia out,

When she married Tesman, Hedda attached Hedda crosses downstage center, clenching her herself to a man who, while intelligent and with fists. She crosses up to her father’s portrait and potential to do well in the future, is only marked by his kneels before it. She bows her head to him and respectability and dependability. By contrast, Eilert paces upstage. She ends at the windows. She Lovborg represents uninhibited expression. While violently closes the drapes and then opens them Tesman is a documentarian of the past, researching again. This moment past, she leans against the and writing about “the domestic handicrafts of wall and stares out the window.

Brabant during the Middle Ages,” Lovborg is a

(Act I) creator (Act I). Lovborg produced his newest work

in two parts: “The first deals with how the various systems at work on our society are changing,” he explains in Act II. “And—the second part is sort of . . . an analysis of where those changes might take us, and a projection of how it might end up.” Tesman is intimidated by Lovborg’s creative genius, and fearful that Lovborg may usurp the professorship he covets.

But Lovborg has no interest; he wants something more significant. “I will not compete with you for a job, Tesman,” he says. “No. I only want to win over you. To be more respected, and more admired than you. (Beat) In the eyes of the world” (Act II). By pursuing this goal, Lovborg has placed himself on a path toward full expression of his true self. The last book he wrote was a manifestation of his social self, “pitched precisely to the general public. No one could possibly disagree with it.” But the next one, he claims, “is the one. The real thing. I put my whole self into this book” (Act II). It is the fullest expression of his essential self that he can create.

When Lovborg, with his ability for open expression, is reunited with Hedda, who has no outlet, chaos unfolds. When Lovborg determines that he cannot go on living, Hedda, accustomed to living vicariously through Lovborg, commands him to create a heroic ending worthy of them both. “Listen to me, Eilert Lovborg,” she commands in Act III. “If you’re going to really do this, do it courageously. Do it gloriously. Do it right!” She admires Lovborg’s bravery, claiming that “Eilert Lovborg settled up with himself.

He had the courage to do what had to be done. To me that is beautiful” (Act IV). Lovborg’s method of taking his own life is really more of Hedda’s making than his own, as she goes on to take ownership of his act of liberation.

BRACK: Liberation? I’m sure it was, for him.

HEDDA: I meant for me. Liberating for me.

To know that there can actually still be acts of courage in this world. Something that literally shimmers with beauty . . . Eilert Lovborg had the courage to live the life he wanted. As he wanted. And was brave enough to end it gloriously. And then walk away from the party when it stopped shimmering and glowing. Even though it was still early.

(Act IV) When Lovborg botches his last act, Hedda realizes the great drama she envisioned for her life has become “funny—it’s comedy, isn’t it? This curse of mine—

everything I touch turns ugly and absurd” (Act IV).

Though she claims to Mrs. Elvsted in Act I that “people don’t do such things,” Hedda has dabbled with the destructive power within the pistols she inherited from her father. Rather than acquiesce to the futility of her situation, Hedda orchestrates a dramatic final act of her own to finally make her intentions heard: Hedda crosses into the library and closes the doors behind her . . . Wild piano music starts up in the library . . .

TESMAN: Hedda—my darling . . . Think of

Aunt Rina! Not to mention Eilert!

HEDDA: (From over her shoulder as she plays.) Yes, and Aunt Julia. And everyone

else. (She stops playing and turns on the

stool to face Tesman.) I’ll be very quiet from

now on, I promise you.

Questions: • What role does the literal work of art, the portrait of General Gabler, play in Hedda Gabler?

• Is the true meaning of a piece of art found in the artist’s intent or what the audience takes away from viewing it? Why does Hedda choose to commit suicide in the way she does?

What does she hope the effect of her actions will be? What will those left behind think her actions mean?

• How is Hedda’s struggle to create similar to Ibsen’s struggle to create? What systems suppress Hedda’s desires and stifle her expression? What obstacles did Ibsen face that prevented his work from being seen and understood?

• Consider the expression, “I put a lot of myself into this work.” What does it mean, especially for artists?

• The role of Hedda Gabler is considered far ahead of its time. Consider complex female characters in today’s pop culture such as Regina George in the film Mean Girls, Nancy Botwin of the television series Weeds, and Cersei Lannister in the Game of Thrones books and television series. How are these characters similar to Hedda Gabler? Where can you see the influence of Hedda Gabler in women’s roles in television and film today?

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For Further Exploration Sigmund Freud, Hedda Gabler, and the Neurotic Personality

According to one Norwegian critic, she is a “monster created by the author in the form of a woman who has no counterpart in the real world.” To other early audience members, she was “abnormal” and “perverted.” Today, she is labeled “villain,” “victim,” and “desperate housewife.” For more than 100 years, critics and audiences alike have struggled with the characterization of Hedda Gabler and attempted to analyze her motivations.

Henrik Ibsen wrote Hedda Gabler around the same time that psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud did his most important work, so it is impossible to know who may have influenced whom. However, Freud’s theories regarding neuroses can help illuminate Hedda’s motivations and actions.

In his work, Freud emphasized the importance of unconscious mental forces on shaping personality. He compared the mind to an iceberg, believing that the conscious part of the mind is the smallest part, just as only a very small portion of an iceberg’s whole is visible above the ocean’s surface. Meanwhile, the preconscious mind lies just below the surface, containing information that can be revealed easily. The deepest layer is the unconscious, consisting of repressed thoughts, feelings, and memories.

Additionally, Freud posited that personality has three components: the id, the ego, and the super-ego. The id is entirely unconscious and is governed by the pleasure principle, which desires instant gratification. The ego is part conscious and part unconscious, using the reality principle to satisfy the id in realistic, long-term ways. The super-ego exists mostly in the preconscious mind, and is home to the morals that children internalize from their parents and society.

Neuroses, Freud posited, were illnesses caused by unconscious conflicts that can manifest themselves as physical, physiological, or mental disturbances, such as anxiety, obsessive-compulsive 12

tendencies, and various phobias.

Most significantly for Hedda Gabler, they are the results of “a poor ability to adapt to one’s environment, an inability to change one’s life patterns, and the inability to develop a richer, more complex, more satisfying personality” (Boeree).

In Sigmund Freud c. 1922. Photo by Hedda’s case, Max Halberstadt. the unconscious conflict is rooted in the tensions between what Ibsen described as the social self and the essential self. The social self is the persona one presents to the world; it conforms to the expectations of society. This persona is developed over time to allow the individual to gain acceptance and masks the desires and impulses (emanating from the id) that may not be socially acceptable. The essential self includes these unacceptable desires and impulses, and represents who the individual truly is. Ibsen’s Realist plays explore the lives of characters in which the social and essential selves are diametrically opposed, and the ramifications of “contradictions between ability and desire, or between will and circumstance, the mingled tragedy and comedy of humanity and the individual” (Melani).

Hedda has personal, subconscious motives for all she does. She is not logical, nor is she insane.

Hedda is full of jealousy over Mrs. Elvsted’s close relationship with Lovborg and over Lovborg’s ability to live an expressive life while he refrains from doing so out of deference to Mrs. Elvsted. She envies

others’ ability to be emotionally and psychologically rich while she suffers from extreme intellectual poverty. Now Tesman’s wife and forced by her social self to stay that way, Hedda embarks on a series of destructive actions. Hedda’s super-ego, after all, was shaped by her upbringing as the child of a warrior. Believing Lovborg’s essential self is being stifled by Mrs. Elvsted, she tempts him into freeing it through alcohol. Frustrated by her own unwanted creation with Tesman, the child with which she is pregnant, Hedda burns the manuscript that Mrs. Elvsted and Lovborg have come to consider a child of their own. Admitting she was too cowardly to shoot Lovborg herself years prior, she provides him with the motivation and the means to do it himself.

She has no use for the plain life Tesman provides, nor does it have any use for her. Motivated by her subconscious, she must create an extreme moment of drama that flies in the face of what is considered acceptable. As Judge Brack responds at the end of Act IV: “People—people—don’t do such things.”

Costume Design for Aunt Julia Tesman by Fabio Toblini.

Questions:

Costume Design for Judge Brack by Fabio Toblini.

• In Act I, Hedda complains to Tesman about Aunt Julia’s manners, saying “to toss your hat on a chair? It’s just not done.” These sentiments are echoed later in Act I when Mrs. Elvsted claims that Lovborg told her that a woman from his past tried to shoot him when he left her, and Hedda replies that the story has “got to be nonsense. People don’t really do that.” What do these contradictions say about the battle between Hedda’s social and essential selves? Which side is more powerful?

• When Judge Brack asks Hedda in Act II why she would want to hurt Aunt Julia with “the business with the hat,” Hedda responds by telling him that she is sometimes not in control of her own actions. “I can’t help it,” she says. “Something just comes over me and I can’t stop myself. I can’t explain it.

It just happens.” Is Hedda being truthful?

Are her darker impulses conscious attempts at presenting an acceptable social self or are they rooted in unconscious destructive desires?

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“A Fiery Woman of Strong Opinions”—Hedda Gabler vs. the Cult of True Womanhood “What does it mean to rebel, to be a fiery woman of strong opinions, in a benumbing, commercialized age? What ‘use’ can an angry woman put her talents to, what meaning does a female revolt have, within a consumer culture that seems to nullify—or, worse, commodify—every act of resistance? What remains on the stripped-down stage of the marketplace but the power grab?”

—Susan Faludi (Foreword to Hedda Gabler)

Since its first production in 1891, Hedda Gabler has been a source of debate and frustration among critics and audience members alike. Some have seen Hedda as a victim of society, describing her as a woman forced into an unhappy marriage, burdened with an unwanted pregnancy, and literally trapped by her femaleness into a mind-numbing existence. Therefore, the play must have been written to illuminate women’s plights. However, attempts to deem Ibsen an early-feminist writer are misleading because Ibsen himself rejected the idea.

When the Norwegian Society for Women’s Rights wished to honor him for his play, A Doll’s House, Ibsen responded: “I have been more of a poet and less of a social philosopher than people generally tend to suppose. I thank you for your toast, but must disclaim the honor of having consciously worked for women’s rights. I am not even quite sure what women’s rights really are. To me, it has been a question of human rights” (Meyer).

Some others have taken up an opposing interpretation, viewing Hedda Gabler as more in the tradition of Shakespeare’s villains, such as Iago and Edmund. These interpretations place more emphasis on Hedda’s instinct to, as Ibsen once described it, “commit a madness,” because “who has not, when standing with someone by an abyss or high up on a tower, had a sudden impulse to push the other over?”

(Meyer).

The truth of who Hedda really is cannot be 14

Costume design for Hedda by Fabio Toblini.

determined without giving equal credit to both nature and nurture. Hedda may have been born with malicious instincts but her circumstances certainly provided apt applications for them. In late 19th century Norway, women were slowly attaining more legal rights. But the image and

behavioral expectations of a domesticated female persisted and was perpetuated by magazines such as Godey’s Lady’s Book, which promoted the idea that true women embraced the values of piety, purity, submissiveness, and domesticity. Coined the “Cult of True Womanhood” in 1966 by American historian Barbara Welter, these values were expected of women who played domestic roles in their families, caring for the home and children, while their husbands went to work and earned the money with which the family could purchase what they needed. These prescribed gender roles implied that the public sphere, which was troublesome and full of temptation, could only be successfully navigated by men. Women were considered too weak and delicate for such stress and conflict, and so were to keep to the privacy of the home for their own protection. Besides, someone must be responsible for the family’s daily care.

The concept of the nuclear family as the centerpiece of society stands in stark opposition to the character of Hedda and her desire to not be trapped by one. In her past as an aristocratic Costume Design for Mrs. Thea Elvsted by Fabio Toblini. debutante, she used her relationship with Lovborg as a channel through which she could experience She contemplates respectable ways of generating the scandals and temptations of the public sphere, excitement and drama, such as pushing Tesman into but as Tesman’s wife, those doors are closed to her. politics and even managing to secure a lengthy travel itinerary for their honeymoon. But with the trip over and marked by disappointment, and the unavoidable reality that a political run is out of Tesman’s financial reach, Hedda cannot maintain the sham of true womanhood any longer. Hedda will not be satisfied with selecting the décor for their new house and caring for a child while waiting for Tesman to arrive home. Hedda’s inner villain is revealed precisely because she cannot sustain a marginalized identity.

Costume Design for Eilert Lovborg by Fabio Toblini.

Questions: • Why is the play titled Hedda Gabler rather than Hedda Tesman?

• In the 19th century, Hedda’s method of suicide was a method much more frequently chosen by men. What does this imply about Hedda’s frustrations and desires? How is Hedda’s suicide a power grab?

• Susan Faludi describes Hedda as a “fiery woman of strong opinions.” Who are the women who fit this description today? To what forces do they stand in opposition? How does society commodify their acts of resistence?

15

The Tesmans and the Credit Crunch

U.S. Debt Statistics • Number of homes lost to foreclosure from 2006-2011: 4 million • Highest foreclosure rate of 2010: 9% (Nevada—1st in this category for 4 years in a row) • Average credit card debt per household with credit cards: $15,956 • Average annual percentage rate for credit cards carrying a balance: 12.78% • Total U.S. revolving debt (98% of which is credit card debt): $801 billion • Total U.S. consumer debt: $205 trillion • Total number of bankruptcy filings in 2009: 1.4 million • 15% of American adults have been late on a credit card payment in the last 12 months • 8% of American adults have missed a credit card payment entirely in the last 12 months • 26% of Americans admit to not paying all of their bills on time • National unemployment rate: 8.3% as of July 2012 • National unemployment rate high during recession of 2007-2009: 10.1% in October 2010 • 40.7% of those unemployed are considered long-term unemployed (27 weeks or more)

When George Tesman and his new wife, Hedda, arrive home from their six-month honeymoon, they move into a former senator’s large, elegant home to begin their new life together. Tesman is updating the house—an impulsive purchase that is still under renovation when they return—to fit his fashionable wife’s tastes, and left many of the arrangements in the hands of his Aunt Julia and a friend, Judge Brack.

When he married Hedda, an aristocratic woman accustomed to an extravagant lifestyle, Tesman believed he could preserve her standard of living by securing a professorship that while not yet his officially, seemed like a foregone conclusion. So he and Hedda went ahead and got married, took a long, expensive honeymoon, purchased and began renovations on the house of Hedda’s dreams, and made plans for an extensive social life. However, Aunt Julia expresses concern about her nephew’s ability to meet his financial commitments in Act I: MISS TESMAN: We were talking about your trip—it must have cost a lot of money, George . . .?

TESMAN: Yes, quite a bit. But the fellowship helped cover

most of it.

MISS TESMAN: Well, I can’t see how you could make that

stretch for two . . .

TESMAN: Quite a feat, isn’t it?

MISS TESMAN: And traveling with a lady—presumably that’s so much more expensive?

TESMAN: Quite true. But Hedda had to have that trip. There was no way around it.

MISS TESMAN: It seems more and more the thing to do these days—everyone had to have a honeymoon abroad…

Tesman left believing that it would not be difficult to pay off any debts he incurred because of his impending professorship. Focused on his good fortune thus far, George has a moment of pause when Aunt Julia inquires as to whether he has any real sense of the financial obligations he has committed to by purchasing the house.

MISS TESMAN: Yes. But George, dear—it’s all going to be expensive. All of this . . .

TESMAN: I know, yes, no, I know, it is . . . yes. Oh dear. Is it?

MISS TESMAN: Oh, dear God, George, you do realize that.

Don’t you?

All statistics are through yearTESMAN: Well. How much? Roughly . . . ? Speaking? A end 2011 unless otherwise wild guess. noted. Sources: U.S. Bureau of MISS TESMAN: I wouldn’t know where to begin until I’ve seen Labor Statistics and RealtyTrac some of the bills.

Foreclosure Report.

(Act I) Aunt Julia’s concerns are not just for Tesman and Hedda’s future. She reveals that to secure the furniture, she had to “put up some security for it” by taking out mortgages on her and her dying sister’s pensions 16

(Act I). She and Tesman uncomfortably agree that it is simply a formality, but the conversation implies that the Tesmans’ situation is precarious and that trouble is not far off.

Confirmation of that trouble comes in the form of Judge Brack.

When Brack arrives, he informs Tesman that while he was away, circumstances surrounding his anticipated university teaching position changed.

There are rumors that Tesman’s rival, Eilert Set Design by Eugene Lee for Hartford Stage’s production of Hedda Gabler.

Lovborg, could pose some competition.

Brack warns Tesman that nothing is certain anymore tried to sell properties they could no longer afford. and that he may have gotten in over his head by With so many homes on the market, selling became agreeing to fulfill every one of Hedda’s wishes: difficult and prices fell sharply, thus leaving many TESMAN: You know Hedda—you know homeowners owing more money than their homes her better than almost anyone. What was I were actually worth. High national unemployment supposed to do—offer her a little apartment rates have further complicated matters for many somewhere on the edge of town? would-be home-buyers. In October 2010, the United BRACK: No, exactly. That’s precisely the States national employment rate reached 10.1%, the problem. highest rate in 26 years.

TESMAN: Well then, fortunately, it can’t be Tesman is essentially unemployed and

too long before I get my promotion. has gone deeply into debt in order to purchase the BRACK: Well, these things tend to sort of lifestyle that people from his wife’s aristocratic class

frag themselves out. expect to have. With no certain way to pay for it, the TESMAN: Do you know something?

Tesmans have been living beyond their means. He BRACK: . . . I think . . . Your promotion is is forced to admit to his wife that he’s “been living not quite the foregone conclusion one hoped in a dreamworld—getting married and setting up a and wished for. home—on nothing but expectations, not actual reality” TESMAN: . . . But Judge . . . Hedda and I got (Act I). If Tesman cannot secure the professorship, married on the prospect of that promotion—! there are serious financial implications for not just Ran up debts! Borrowed money from Aunt him and Hedda, but for elderly Aunts Julia and Julia!

Because that job was practically Rinna, too. promised to me!

(Act I) Questions:

The Tesmans’ predicament at the beginning • Why is Tesman so relieved when he learns that of the play is a familiar one to modern audiences. In Lovborg is not interested in the professorship? the early 2000s, home values and prices increased What are the short and long-term implications dramatically due to speculation, creating the “housing for Tesman’s future as an academic if he bubble.” Buyers, already carrying more debt than receives the position while Lovborg continues ever before, took on mortgages with variable interest to work independently in the field? What rates. But as speculation sent projected housing would Tesman do to support his family if he values higher, banks also increased the interest rates did not receive the professorship? on variable rate loans. The number of subprime • Consider Eugene Lee’s set design for Hartford mortgages (high risk loans with high interest rates Stage’s production of Hedda Gabler. What is that a bank gives to people with weaker credit Lee trying to say about the Tesmans’ finances? histories) grew higher than ever before. Soon, the Why is the house so unfinished? housing bubble “burst” when large numbers of buyers found they were unable to pay back their loans and 17

Suggested Activities Compare and Contrast

Hedda Gabler is often described as the “Hamlet of women’s roles.” Compare and contrast the following speech by Hamlet with a series of statements made by Hedda. What is each character’s emotional state?

How do they each view death? What reasons does each give for why someone would want to die? What is each character more concerned with: the act of suicide or the effects of it? Why? HAMLET To be, or not to be: that is the question: Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep; No more; and by a sleep to say we end The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to, ‘tis a consummation Devoutly to be wish’d. To die, to sleep; To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub; For in that sleep of death what dreams may come When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, Must give us pause: there’s the respect That makes calamity of so long life; For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, The oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely, The pangs of despised love, the law’s delay, The insolence of office and the spurns That patient merit of the unworthy takes, When he himself might his quietus make With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear, To grunt and sweat under a weary life, But that the dread of something after death, The undiscover’d country from whose bourn No traveller returns, puzzles the will And makes us rather bear those ills we have Than fly to others that we know not of?

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all; And thus the native hue of resolution Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought, And enterprises of great pith and moment With this regard their currents turn awry, And lose the name of action.

(III.1)

18

HEDDA: We did agree, didn’t we, that we were going to have a particular kind of life? A social life?

Entertain, have parties, did we not? That was the bargain. And of course, I’m going to presume that a butler is no longer realistic . . . And the same goes for the horse you promised me . . . I know. I should put that right out of my head . . . Well, at least I have one thing left to amuse myself with . . . My pistols.

(Act I) HEDDA: Listen to me, Eilert Lovborg. If you’re going to really do this, do it courageously. Do it gloriously. Do it right . . . No vine leaves. I don’t believe in any of that anymore. But gloriously nonetheless. You have to go now, Eilert. (Beat) Don’t come back . . . (She goes to the desk and takes one of her father’s revolvers out of the case.) Do you recognize this? It was aimed at you once . . . Here.

(Lovborg takes the revolver and places it in his breast pocket.) Do it gloriously, Eilert Lovborg. Promise me that.

(Act III) HEDDA: Ah, Judge. What Eilert Lovborg’s done— it’s an amazing act of liberation . . . Liberating for me. To know that there can actually still be acts of courage in this world. Something that literally shimmers with beauty . . . Oh, I know what you’re going to say, because finally, after all is said and done, you’re really sort of a specialist too, aren’t you? Just like—yes! You can admit it to me . . . All I will say is that Eilert Lovborg had the courage to live the life he wanted. As he wanted. And was brave enough to end it gloriously. And then walk away from the party when it stopped shimmering and glowing. Even though it was still early.

(Act IV)

Creative Writing—Obituary

An obituary is a news article that reports a person’s death and is generally written by a close family member. It usually includes information about the deceased individual such as their age, city of residence, cause of death, profession, life accomplishments, personal interests, names of surviving family members, and details about the location and time of the upcoming funeral. Obituaries for those who have committed suicide, however, can be challenging due to sensitivity surrounding the nature of the person’s passing. Some families wish to keep the cause of death private while others do include it in order to raise awareness.

Imagine you are George Tesman and must write an obituary for your wife, Hedda, after her suicide. Consider the following: • How did local people perceive Hedda before your marriage? What was her reputation?

• Why do you think she took the drastic action of shooting herself?

• Do you want to reveal Hedda’s cause of death to the public? How much do you think people already know?

• What do you plan to do next?

Improvisation—Preoccupation Party

In Hedda Gabler, characters frequently have ulterior motives. They must maintain socially accepted behaviors while simultaneously finding out information, inciting someone to take an action, or asserting their power over others. In this improv game, players must work to participate fully in an imaginary party while pursuing an ulterior motive, consistently maintaining a personality quirk, or demonstrating symptoms of a phobia. The host of the party must determine what each guest’s preoccupation is.

• Determine who will play the host and who will play the guests (at least 4).

• Secretly assign each guest a quirk or phobia.

Some examples could be: • Kleptomania (a compulsion to steal things • Fear of crowds • Fear of eye contact • Extreme emotions • Hypochondria (constant belief that one is sick) • Paranoia about being followed

• The host should begin setting up for the party by arranging furniture, putting out “food,” choosing music, etc.

• One at a time, each guest should approach the imaginary door and ring the doorbell.

• As the host welcomes each guest into their home, the guests must demonstrate their quirk or phobia as they interact with the host and each other.

• Once all of the guests have arrived, the host can start making guesses as to what each guest’s preoccupation is.

Playing Subtext

In realist plays, characters often convey just as much, if not more, meaning with what they do not say than what they do. Understanding subtext is vital to playing realism because how a character says something can be used to communicate something very different. Begin this subtext exercise by choosing any scene from Hedda Gabler and determine the following: • What is each character’s objective? What does he or she want?

• What are the characters doing to get what they want?

• What obstacles are standing in their way?

• Who holds the power in the scene?

• Who is each character’s social self? Describe the image they present to others.

• Who is each character’s essential self? Deep down, how do they feel and what do they think about the situation?

• What secrets are the characters keeping? What are they not revealing in words?

Read the scene out loud, taking notes on what actually happens in the scene. Next, the actors will replay the scene to reveal subtext.

• Each actor should choose one word that best represents their character’s essential self.

• Replay an improvised version of the scene (use your notes as a guide) in which the only vocalizations allowed are the words each actor has chosen to represent them.

• Notice what happens when words are limited.

How can the actors use vocal inflections to express what they really mean?

Go back and replay the scene using the original dialogue, but applying the vocal tones and qualities from the improvised performance to add additional layers of meaning.

19

SOURCES CliffsNotes.com. Psychodynamic Perspectives. 16 Aug 2012 <http://www.cliffsnotes.com/study_guide/topicArticleId25438,articleId-25388.html>.

Davis, Rick, Brian Johnston, and Robert Sanford Brustein.

Ibsen in an Hour. Hanover, NH: In an Hour, 2010. Print.

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For more information about education programs at Hartford Stage, please call (860) 520-7206 or email education@hartfordstage.org

Meyer, Michael. “Introduction to Hedda Gabler.” Ibsen Plays: Two. London: Metheuen Drama, 2000. Print.

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Contributing Editor Alexandra Truppi Education Programs Associate With Contributions by Jennifer Roberts Director of Education