United States or Haiti ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
I was in a very reckless and discontented mood, but I was able to get away from myself and become Hedda for awhile; and this made me think of what a wonderful thing it is, what a power Ibsen has, to produce such emotions by merely stringing a few words together. Why, the very name Hedda, Hedda Gabler! When Eilert says it, what does it not convey!
The same test of truthfulness by which we distinguish good workmanship from bad is the only test by which we may conclusively distinguish immoral art from moral. Yet many of the controversial critics never calm down sufficiently to apply this test. Instead of arguing whether or not Ibsen tells the truth about Hedda Gabler, they quarrel with him or defend him for talking about her at all.
In other circumstances, Hedda would have been a power for beauty and good." If this ingenious theory be correct, Hedda Gabler must be considered as the leading example of Ibsen's often-repeated demonstration, that evil is produced by circumstances and not by character.
She got what she wanted for she wanted only dross. Ibsen's Button-Moulder will meet her at the Cross-Roads when her time comes. Hedda, like Strindberg's Julia, may escape him because, coward as she was when facing harsh reality, she had the courage to rid her family of a worthless encumbrance.
The sheer symbolism of the poet-philosopher is powerfully suggestive, and these later plays have an interest of their own, no doubt; but it is in the earlier social dramas that Ibsen most clearly reveals his dramaturgic genius, in the 'Pillars of Society, and the 'Doll's House, in 'Ghosts' and in 'Hedda Gabler. Dennery might envy the ingenuity with which Consul Bernick is tempted to insist on the fatal order that seems for a season to be the death-sentence of his own son; and Sardou would appreciate the irony of Nora's frantic dance at the very moment when she was tortured by deadly fear.
Like Hedda she is ambitious to outshine any circle in which she finds herself. Modern she is, not because of her petty traits, but simply because Mr. Moore has painted a young woman of the day, rich, and so selfish that at the end her selfishness strangles the little soul she possesses. She is ambitious.
I cannot live without one." For her "mad and sane are the same misprint." And on this lyric note the book closes. I believe if Hedda Gabler had hesitated and her father's pistol hadn't been hard by, she would have recovered her poise and deceived her husband. I believe that if Emma Bovary had escaped that snag of debt she would have continued to fool Charles.
There were a number of striking looking models present whom Eugene knew either by reputation, whispered comment of friends, or personally Zelma Desmond, who had posed for Eugene, Hedda Anderson, Anna Magruder and Laura Matthewson among others. Angela was struck and in a way taken by the dash and beauty of these girls.
Interesting as 'Hedda Gabler' is on the stage and in the study, suggestive as it is, it cannot be called one of Ibsen's best-built plays. Technically considered it falls below his higher level; it does not sustain itself even at the elevation of the 'Demi-monde' or of the 'Effrontés. It does not compel us to accept its characters and its situations without question.
A Russian actress of extreme talent, Madame Alla Nazimova, who has had special opportunities of studying the part of Hedda Gabler, has lately depicted her as "aristocratic and ill-mated, ambitious and doomed to a repulsive alliance with a man beneath her station, whom she had mistakenly hoped would give her position and wealth.
Word Of The Day