Hedda Gabler

2 Pages 514 Words

Henrik Ibsen wrote Hedda Gabler in 1890. It takes place in the Tesman’s house in Norway. The main characters are Hedda, the well-bred aristocratic daughter of the famous General Gabler, George Tesman, Hedda’s newlywed husband and an intelligent scholar, Juliana Tesman, George’s aunt who supports and raised him, Mrs. Thea Elvsted, a childhood friend of Hedda’s, Judge Brack, a worldly and cynical man who likes to meddle in people’s affairs, and Eilert Loevborg, Tesman’s biggest academic competitor and a former suitor of Heddas.
The play starts off as Hedda and George are just getting back from their six-month honeymoon. George has gone through great lengths to purchase the house that he thinks Hedda so badly desires. He is not a rich man and Hedda is accustomed to living a wealthy lifestyle. Hedda does not love George, but he is ignorant to that fact. She has only married him because she thought he had more money than he really does. Hedda thinks it will be a marriage of convenience. She is bored with his dull personality and despises his family and the fact that she is tied there. Throughout the play it is hinted that Hedda is pregnant. She confides to Judge Brack that ‘she has made her bed and now she must lie in it.’
Hedda is deeply stirred by the return of her former suitor, Eilert Loevborg. He was once a drunk and a public outcast, but now is an aspiring writer and scholar. Eilert has a close relationship with Mrs. Elvsted. Together they have written a brilliant manuscript, which is portrayed as ‘their child’. Their relationship makes Hedda extremely jealous.
One night all the men go out drinking and Eilert ends up losing the manuscript on his way home. He is so ashamed he cannot remember what happened to it that he lies to Mrs. Elvsted and tells her he destroyed it. George found the manuscript and brought it home with intentions to give it back to Eilert after he sobers up. In the meanti...