Hedda Gabler Research Paper

Many of Ibsen's plays contain criticism regarding marriage, which portrays a dominant and complex female character that are generally trapped in unhappy and unsatisfied marriages due to the Victorian era traditions (Richard Chang and Richkie Chiu). Hedda Gabler (1890) is one of his well known plays, that contains a family's character with that role. Hedda plays the role of the primary female character, she struggles to find her spot in her new life, and adjusting to her dominant side, due to that she will never become

Hedda Gabler is portrayed as an extremely strong-willed woman. During the times in which this play is set, numerous women’s rights and suffrage movements were occurring across the world. It can be inferred that Hedda’s assertive attitude is characteristic of the time period. To Hedda, it is preposterous that she would have to be under the power of a man. When Judge Brock implies that he will disavow all knowledge of the source of the gun that killed Lövborg if Hedda becomes “subject to [his] will and demands” (Ibsen 262). She states, “No longer free! No! That’s a thought that I’ll never endure!” (Ibsen 262). At this time women across the world were adopting new ideas on their place in society. The atmosphere of the era provides an explanation of the source of Hedda’s manipulations.

On the contrary, Hedda is a character who deeply desires control and freedom, yet has neither due to her fear of scandal. At 29 years old, she married George Tesman, whom she does not love, but felt she had, “danced [herself] tired,” (Act II). Hedda is subsequently disappointed with the dullness of her role in marriage, where she was hoping for a new adventure outside her father’s control. Similarly, she refuses to even consider the possibility of an affair with Brack, even as he pressures her so; she reacts with repulsion at the suggestion. Hedda’s deeply-ingrained fear of scandal prevents her from living up to her potential; she resorts to following a path of unemployment and

One of Hedda's main points in life is to control her position in society. She does everything in her power to avoid any type of scandal in the community and to go along with the norms of society. This occurs with her decision of marrying George Tesman, even though she had feelings

In the play “Hedda Gabler” the main character is Hedda Tasman, she is a young bride married to a very smart man named George Tasman. Hedda posses’ characteristics of being unhappy and somewhat heroic. She was expected to live up to what society shaped women to be. Women of this time period were seen as nothing more than a mother and housewife. This made her unhappy as she did not want to conform to the ways

Just like Nora and Helene, Hedda prefers to pretend instead of dealing with reality.  She hides behind the accepted social roles by marrying someone who is dependable as a husband but whom she doesn't love.  "Lovorg.  Ah, I understand.  It offends your love for George Tesman.  Hedda.  Love? You are absurd!" (737).  She marries Tesman so she can have control over other people.  She thrives on jealousy, social ambition, and a need to dominate others.  She needs to degrade others to improve her own self-image;

Hedda tears down everyone throughout the play, with Lövborg and Brack as the only exception. After being born to a high standing family, her expectations of power are high, but due to her biologic form as a woman she is trapped and unable to take control, “because Hedda has been imprisoned since girlhood by the bars of Victorian propriety, her emotional life has grown turbulent and explosive” (Embler). However, after succumbing to marriage with Tesman, whom she only marries for money and respect, she loses her place in society as she, as a mere woman, cannot retain it. This slowly unwinds Hedda and eventually leads her on to her fatal path. By

Hedda was bound by courageous acts, in the end of act four, Hedda kills herself, and in act three, she burns Eilert's manuscript. Not because she wants to help her husband George, as she tells him. But because she hates Thea, I honestly thinks it’s jealousy, because Thea seems happy with her life and Hedda doesn’t really seem to be happy, as shown in act four where she shoots herself. Thea is bound by convention, she was helping Eilert write a book, but when Eilert tells her that he lost it she is very much upset with him, but unfortunately never tells him she is sorry because she never gets the chance, he dies in a hospital room all alone, shot himself in the breast. Hedda thinks it’s an act of pure beauty until Judge Brack, to when he tells

Henrik Ibsen’s play Hedda Gabler focuses on the life of a strong willed woman named Hedda Tesman. Act one of Hedda Gabler introduced Hedda’s newlywed husband George Tesman. Hedda Gabler married George after her father, General Gabler passed away and became Hedda Tesman. It could be possible that Hedda only married George Tesman because she needed security in her life while adjusting to the loss of her father. On the other hand, Hedda was unsure that a secure and stable life was what she truly desired. Hedda Gabler’s upbringing, the death of her father, and the unhappiness and unsatisfactory life all played a role in the lack of passion she had to genuinely connect with other be people.

Especially when she saw how Mrs. Elevsted aroused Mr. Lovborg into creating his book; She thought if the humble Mrs. Elvsted could inspire Mr. Lovborg. Then the powerful Hedda would have no problem in influencing Lovborg, but unfortunately, she was completely wrong. Emotional pressure of weakness affected Hedda, as she realizes that she lacks inspiration. After Lovborg’s death, judge Brack knew that it was Hedda who gave him the pistol to commit suicide, which lead her into getting blackmailed by judge Brack. Judge Brack whispered softly, “Dearest Hedda…Believe me…I shall not abuse my advantage.”

Those become small scale when compared to what is really happening. Ibsen’s play is considered to be social realism, and rightfully so. He is trying to get a message across with Hedda about the issues of her life and that of women’s lives, in general, during the time period. Hedda is not just wanting control for herself. She is representing women in their need for equality and desire for independence. The play is meant to be a break from the conventional past and an introduction to a new era. Hedda’s immoral behavior and transgressions only show how desperate the calling for freedom and self control really is among women. Therefore, her death is an emotional blow to the audience and becomes a call to action. Society’s view of women needs to change in order for the next Hedda to

Tesman on the other hand is associated with notes about medieval homemaking, also Tesman has never made any piece of work and only looks and study other peoples work, the notes that he is studying is all about how woman took care of the house a very feminine subject making it seem as he is sharing traits of femininity. The masculinity and femininity roles of Hedda and Tasman where switched and at the time when gender roles where very strict and barely ever broken out of. This reverse of gender roles in that time period help show off Hedda’s character development through controlling Tesman as well as be in a position of power which she strides for. The importance of Being Earnest on the other hand has more specific meaning about being homosexual or adulterous in that time period. There are two main props that have deeper meaning, the cigarette box and the green ring. The grey cigarette case is known to “well-off gay men paid their male prostitutes to avoid prosecution; favorites even got their names engraved inside” (citation) which is important because it shows that this person is leading a double life of leading two separate lives like many homosexuals and men that where not monogamous had, and it is also important because all of the gay

In Hedda Gabler, Henrik Ibsen portrays the hopeless struggle of woman in the Victorian era through the protagonist, Hedda. From 1837 to 1901 in England, women experienced unrestrained oppression, were expected to follow the orders of their husbands, and were believed to be unwise. In the play, the newly wed Hedda has just arrived to her new husband, Tesmun’s home town, and her whole world seems to be shrinking inch by inch, expressed mainly through elements of stagecraft. The play is mostly focused around the main character, Hedda, a tragic heroine. Her need to manipulate others grows ever stronger as her boredom and despair increase, due to the new middle class atmosphere she is forced into. At last, she frees herself from all of the social restrictions society has imposed on her, by completing the act of suicide. Through the characterization of Hedda, Ibsen explores the oppression of woman in the Victorian Era.

There is a huge difference in the judgments that are made in the moral system and the behaviors and the character trait the characters possess. This play is mainly written because Ibsen feels angry that people suffer from repression and are deprived of joy. He is surely optimistic to break free of society and to having the courage to be yourself and mainly to have ‘livesklegn’ and factors like class and gender should not determine. Soren Kierkegaard is one that understands Ibsen, ‘Boredom is root of all evil-the despairing refusal to be oneself’, just like all his other quotes it summarize the things that mattered to Ibsen. Society in Norway is one that militates against self-realization. You could have never been a complete individual in the 19ths century in

Alienation in Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler is based particularly on personal alienation highlighted through the main character Hedda. Hedda is the perfect representation of an alienated individual asserted against a conventional society. Ibsen focuses particularly on the ownership of Hedda Gabler, from the ownership of her father into the hands of George Tesman, to see Hedda to never be in complete ownership of herself until she takes the matters into her own hands and claims her own life by committing suicide at the end of the play. She is lost in a world where she no longer has anyone, beside herself and her pistols, which she continually shoots off as these pistols can be seen to dramatize Hedda’s disconnect from the world and the frustrations she feels towards it. Arguably she has nothing to look forward too, besides the continual hounding from George