Original language ：Norwegian

Subject ： a newlywed struggles with an existence she finds devoid of excitement and enchantment

Genre ： Drama Setting ： Jørgen Tesman's

villa, Kristiania,Norway; 1890s

title page of the 1890 text

• Hedda Gabler is a play first published in 1890 by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. The play premiered in 1891 in Germany to negative reviews, but has subsequently gained recognition as a classic of realism, nineteenth century theatre, and world drama. A 1902 production was a major sensation on Broadway starring Minnie Maddern Fiske and following its initial limited run was revived with the actress the following year.

• The character of Hedda is considered by some critics as one of the great dramatic roles in theatre, the "female Hamlet," and some portrayals have been very controversial. Depending on the interpretation, Hedda may be portrayed as an idealistic heroine fighting society, a victim of circumstance, a prototypical feminist, or a manipulative villain.

The Basic Set

With Window Shutters Closed

• Hedda's married name is Hedda Tesman; Gabler is her maiden name. On the subject of the title, Ibsen wrote:"My intention in giving it this name was to indicate that Hedda as a personality is to be regarded rather as her father's daughter than her husband's wife."

• George Tesman - The husband of Hedda, an academic

• Hedda Gabler - The heroine

• Miss Juliane Tesman (Aunty Juju) - Aunt of George

• Mrs. Thea Elvsted - Friend of Hedda and George, confidant of Ejlert

• Judge Brack - Friend of the Tesmans

• Ejlert Løvborg - George's academic rival whom Hedda previously loved

• Bertha - Servant to the Tesmans and to George as a child.

Cate Blanchett in Hedda Gabler.

• Hedda Gabler  -  Hedda is the daughter of the famous General Gabler; as a child she was used to luxury and high-class living. As the play begins, she is returning from her honeymoon with Jürgen Tesman, a scholar with good prospects but not as much money as Hedda is accustomed to. Her married name is Hedda Tesman. Hedda is an intelligent, unpredictable, and somewhat dishonest young woman who is not afraid to manipulate her husband and friends.

Pressure … Cate Blanchett as Hedda Gabler.

• Jürgen Tesman  -  Tesman is an amiable, intelligent young scholar. He tries very hard to please his young wife, Hedda, and often does not realize that she is manipulating him. In fact, he often seems foolish for his age, and when he annoys Hedda, the audience has reason to sympathize with her. Tesman is hoping for a professorship in history, and at the beginning of the play it seems that his one great rival, Ejlert Lövborg, a notorious alcoholic, no longer stands in Tesman's way. Tesman was raised by his Aunt Julle.

• Juliane Tesman  -  Juliane Tesman, or Aunt Julle, is the aunt of Jürgen Tesman. After Tesman's parents died, Aunt Julle raised him. She is well-meaning, and she is constantly hinting that Tesman and Hedda should have a baby. Aunt Julle tries to get along with Hedda, but the difference in their class backgrounds is painfully apparent. Aunt Julle lives with the ailing Aunt Rina, another aunt of Tesman's.

• 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.

Kate Burton and Harris Yulin in Hedda Gabler

• Ejlert Lövborg -  A genius, Ejlert Lövoborg is Tesman* biggest competitor in the academic world. After a series of scandals related to drinking, he was once a public outcast but has now returned to the city and has published a book to rave reviews. He also has another manuscript that is even more promising. Mrs. Elvsted helped him with both manuscripts. He once shared a close relationship with Hedda.

Kate Burton and David Lansbury in Hedda Gabler

• Mrs. Elvsted -  Mrs. Elvsted is a meek but passionate woman. She and her husband hired Ejlert Lövborg as a tutor to their children, and Mrs. Elvsted grew attached to Ejlert, acting as his personal secretary and aiding him in his research and writing. When Ejlert leaves her estate to return to the city, Mrs. Elvsted comes to town and goes to Tesman for help, fearing Ejlert will revert to his alcoholism. Mrs. Elvsted went to school with Hedda and remembers being tormented by her.

Berte -  Berte is George and Hedda Tesman's servant. Formerly, she was the servant in Juliane Tesman's household. She tries very hard to please Hedda, her new mistress, but Hedda is quite dissatisfied with her.

Aunt Rina -  Aunt Rina is dying at the start of the play. She never appears onstage. She helped Aunt Julle raise Tesman*

The action takes place in a villa in Kristiania (now Oslo). Hedda Gabler, daughter of an aristocratic General, has just returned from her honeymoon with Jørgen Tesman, an aspiring young academic, reliable but not brilliant, who has combined research with their honeymoon. It becomes clear in the course of the play that she has never loved him but has married him for reasons pertaining to the boring nature of her life, and it is suggested that she may be pregnant. The reappearance of Tesman's academic rival, Ejlert Løvborg, throws their lives into disarray.

Løvborg, a writer, is also a recovered alcoholic who has wasted his talent until now. Thanks to a relationship with Hedda's old schoolmate, The Elvsted (who has left her husband for him), he shows signs of rehabilitation and has just completed a bestseller in the same field as Tesman. The critical success of his recently published work transforms Løvborg into a threat to Tesman, as Løvborg becomes a competitor for the university professorship Tesman had been counting on. The couple are financially overstretched and Tesman now tells Hedda that he will not be able to finance the regular entertaining or luxurious housekeeping that Hedda had been looking forward to. 

• Upon meeting Løvborg however, the couple discover that he has no intention of competing for the professorship, but rather has spent the last few years labouring with Mrs. Elvsted over what he considers to be his masterpiece, the "sequel" to his recently published work. Hedda, apparently jealous of Mrs. Elvsted's influence over Løvborg, hopes to come between them, and provokes Løvborg to get drunk and go to a party.

• Tesman returns home from the party and reveals that he found the manuscript of Løvborg's great work, which the latter has lost while drunk. When Hedda next sees Løvborg, he confesses to her, despairingly, that he has lost the manuscript. Instead of telling him that the manuscript has been found, Hedda encourages him to commit suicide, giving him a pistol. She then burns the manuscript. She tells her husband she has destroyed it to secure their future.

Martha Plimpton as Hedda Gabler, Steppenwolf Theater 2001

Cate Blanchett as Hedda Gabler, Sydney Theater 2004

• When the news comes that Løvborg has indeed killed himself, Tesman and Mrs. Elvsted are determined to try to reconstruct his book from what they already know. Hedda is shocked to discover, from the sinister Judge Brack, that Løvborg's death, in a brothel, was messy and probably accidental (this "ridiculous and vile" death contrasts the "beautiful and free" one that Hedda had imagined for him). Worse, Brack knows where the pistol came from. This means that he has power over her, which he will use to insinuate himself into the household (there is a strong implication that he will force Hedda into a sexual affair). Leaving the others, she goes into her smaller room and ends the play by shooting herself in the temple.

• Ibsen's Hedda Gabler (1963 TV - Ingrid Bergman) 

Aunt Julle and Berte enter the drawing room of the Tesmans' residence. The Tesmans have just returned from their six-month honeymoon. Berte says that she is worried about whether she can please her new mistress, Hedda. Jürgen Tesman enters the room and joyously greets his aunt. He compliments her on her new hat, and they discuss the research he did on his honeymoon and Aunt Rina's failing health. They hint at the extravagance of the honeymoon and the expense of appeasing a lady of aristocratic background like Hedda. In fact, Aunt Julle announces that she has mortgaged her annuity to provide security on the expensive new house. She also mentions that Ejlert Lövborg has published a new book; this is a surprise to Tesman.

Hedda enters and complains that the maid has opened the windows. Hedda is very particular about the lighting, and Tesman is eager to please her. Aunt Julle produces Jürgen's old slippers, much to his delight. He wants Hedda to examine them, but she is not interested. Hedda interrupts their conversation with a comment on the ugliness of Aunt Julle's hat, which Hedda takes to be the maid's. Aunt Julle is offended, but Hedda apologizes. To defuse the situation, Tesman hopes to prompt Aunt Julle to compliment Hedda by drawing her attention to the way Hedda has pleasantly filled out over the course of their honeymoon--but Hedda refuses to admit that the six months have changed her at all.

Aunt Julle leaves, and Tesman asks Hedda to try to be nicer to her. They agree to have her over again later that day. Hedda mentions that her old piano doesn't look right in the drawing room, and Tesman considers exchanging it when he gets his next paycheck. Hedda suggests they simply buy a new one. Suddenly, Mrs. Elvsted, an old acquaintance of both, arrives. She is in town looking for Ejlert Lövborg, who has for two years served as tutor in the Elvsted household. Mrs. Elvsted informs the Tesman's that Ejlert has been free of drunkenness for two years, but she fears a relapse now that Ejlert has returned to the city. She has followed him here in order to keep an eye on him. She tells Tesman what a tremendous success Ejlert's new book has been; it is obvious that Tesman has to make an effort not to seem jealous. Tesman promises to be supportive of Ejlert if he comes to visit, but Hedda proposes that he go so far as to write to Ejlert and invite him to visit. She suggests he write Ejlert a long letter. Tesman goes to do this, and Hedda presses Mrs. Elvsted to confide in her now that she has gotten rid of Tesman.

She also mentions that Ejlert Lövborg has published a new book; this is a surprise to Tesman. Hedda enters and complains that the maid has opened the windows. Hedda is very particular about the lighting, and Tesman is eager to please her. Aunt Julle produces Jürgen's old slippers, much to his delight. He wants Hedda to examine them, but she is not interested. Hedda interrupts their conversation with a comment on the ugliness of Aunt Julle's hat, which Hedda takes to be the maid's. Aunt Julle is offended, but Hedda apologizes. To defuse the situation, Tesman hopes to prompt Aunt Julle to compliment Hedda by drawing her attention to the way Hedda has pleasantly filled out over the course of their honeymoon--but Hedda refuses to admit that the six months have changed her at all.

Aunt Julle and Berte enter the drawing room of the Tesmans' residence. The Tesmans have just returned from their six-month honeymoon. Berte says that she is worried about whether she can please her new mistress, Hedda. Jürgen Tesman enters the room and joyously greets his aunt. He compliments her on her new hat, and they discuss the research he did on his honeymoon and Aunt Rina's failing health. They hint at the extravagance of the honeymoon and the expense of appeasing a lady of aristocratic background like Hedda. In fact, Aunt Julle announces that she has mortgaged her annuity to provide security on the expensive new house.

Aunt Julle leaves, and Tesman asks Hedda to try to be nicer to her. They agree to have her over again later that day. Hedda mentions that her old piano doesn't look right in the drawing room, and Tesman considers exchanging it when he gets his next paycheck. Hedda suggests they simply buy a new one. Suddenly, Mrs. Elvsted, an old acquaintance of both, arrives. She is in town looking for Ejlert Lövborg, who has for two years served as tutor in the Elvsted household. Mrs. Elvsted informs the Tesman's that Ejlert has been free of drunkenness for two years, but she fears a relapse now that Ejlert has returned to the city. She has followed him here in order to keep an eye on him. She tells Tesman what a tremendous success Ejlert's new book has been; it is obvious that Tesman has to make an effort not to seem jealous. Tesman promises to be supportive of Ejlert if he comes to visit, but Hedda proposes that he go so far as to write to Ejlert and invite him to visit. She suggests he write Ejlert a long letter. Tesman goes to do this, and Hedda presses Mrs. Elvsted to confide in her now that she has gotten rid of Tesman.

• Joseph Wood Krutch makes a connection between Hedda Gabler and Freud, whose first work on psychoanalysis was published almost a decade later. Hedda is one of the first fully developed neurotic heroines of literature. By that Krutch means that Hedda is neither logical nor insane in the old sense of being random and unaccountable.

• Her aims and her motives have a secret personal logic of their own. She gets what she wants, but what she wants is not anything that the normal usually admit, publicly at least, to be desirable. One of the significant things that such a character implies is the premise that there is a secret, sometimes unconscious, world of aims and methods — one might almost say a secret system of values — that is often much more important than the rational one.

• Joan Templeton makes a connection between Hedda Gabler and Hjørdis from The Vikings at Helgeland, since the arms-bearing, horse-riding Hedda, married to a passive man she despises, indeed resembles the “eagle in a cage” that Hjørdis terms herself.

It is fitting that the title of the play is Hedda's maiden name, Hedda Gabler, for the play is to a large extent about the formerly aristocratic Hedda's inability to adjust to the bourgeois life into which she has married. Her tragedy lies not only in her own suicide but in her desire that Ejlert should have a "beautiful" suicide: she hopes that life can be beautiful, can measure up to a certain standard, regardless of practicalities like professional success or failure. She is amused by how much Tesman worries about making a living.

This aristocratic privileging of "aesthetic" matters causes Hedda to feel very unsympathetic to Tesman. She doesn't allow him to use the word "we" to describe the two of them. It also allows her to feel little guilt when "cheating on" him, if only on an emotional level, with Ejlert and Judge Brack. Her values, based on an aesthetic standard rather than the moral standard to which her husband conforms, are beyond Tesman's control or even his understanding; as a result, he cannot predict her actions. At the same time, however, Hedda's apparent pregnancy draws attention to the tragic nature of her quest. She continually denies the inevitable.

The rest of the male characters are more or less in love with Hedda, perhaps because of her almost decadent sense of beauty. Brack wants to establish a private relationship with her, parallel to her relationship with Tesman, and Ejlert dearly hopes that she shares his "passion for life." She finds both of these ideas silly, openly rejecting Ejlert's notion and teasing Brack by saying that he wants to be "the cock of the walk." Even Mrs. Elvsted feels intimidated by Hedda. Because of this popularity, she is the most powerful character. She toys with others because she can find no solace or entertainment in life. Indeed, Hedda's power is so far-reaching that her own self-destruction leads almost inevitably to the destruction of the other characters' lives.

• It is fitting that the title of the play is Hedda's maiden name, Hedda Gabler, for the play is to a large extent about the formerly aristocratic Hedda's inability to adjust to the bourgeois life into which she has married. Her tragedy lies not only in her own suicide but in her desire that Ejlert should have a "beautiful" suicide: she hopes that life can be beautiful, can measure up to a certain standard, regardless of practicalities like professional success or failure. She is amused by how much Tesman worries about making a living.

• This aristocratic privileging of "aesthetic" matters causes Hedda to feel very unsympathetic to Tesman. She doesn't allow him to use the word "we" to describe the two of them. It also allows her to feel little guilt when "cheating on" him, if only on an emotional level, with Ejlert and Judge Brack. Her values, based on an aesthetic standard rather than the moral standard to which her husband conforms, are beyond Tesman's control or even his understanding; as a result, he cannot predict her actions. At the same time, however, Hedda's apparent pregnancy draws attention to the tragic nature of her quest. She continually denies the inevitable.

• The rest of the male characters are more or less in love with Hedda, perhaps because of her almost decadent sense of beauty. Brack wants to establish a private relationship with her, parallel to her relationship with Tesman, and Ejlert dearly hopes that she shares his "passion for life." She finds both of these ideas silly, openly rejecting Ejlert's notion and teasing Brack by saying that he wants to be "the cock of the walk." Even Mrs. Elvsted feels intimidated by Hedda. Because of this popularity, she is the most powerful character. She toys with others because she can find no solace or entertainment in life. Indeed, Hedda's power is so far-reaching that her own self-destruction leads almost inevitably to the destruction of the other characters' lives.

Awards 1992 Laurence Olivier Award for Best Revival

2006 Laurence Olivier Award for Best Revival

Nominations 2005 Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Revival

• An operatic adaptation of the play has been produced by Shanghai's Hangzhou Xiao Bai Hua Yue Opera House. A turkey living in Morningside Park, New York City, was named, "Hedda Gobbler."

• The Scottish folk indie-rock band Broken Records have recorded a track, due to appear on their debut album later in 2009, entitled "If Eilert Løvborg Wrote A Song, It Would Sound Like This".

• Welsh musician John Cale recorded a song entitled "Hedda Gabler," which he recently performed live in London (5 March 2010) with a band and a 19 piece orchestra in his Paris 1919 tour, attended by such celebrities as Sex and the City's Kim Cattrall, Samson and Delilah's Peter Hennessy, Irish Actor Cillian Murphy and award-winning viola player Jessica Lavery.

• Chekhov's gun• ^ Billington, Michael (17 March 2005). "Hedda Gabler,

Almeida, London". The Guardian. Retrieved 2008-10-05.• ^ Tracy Sanders (2006). "Lecture Notes: Hedda Gabler - Fiend

or Heroine". Australian Catholic University. Retrieved 2008-10-05.

• ^ Krutch, Joseph Wood (1953). Modernism in Modern Drama: A Definition and an Estimate. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. pp. 11. OCLC 255757831.

• ^ Templeton, Joan (2000). Ibsen's Women. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 229. ISBN 0521590396.

• ^ "Hedda Gabler: Play, Drama". The Internet Broadway Database. 2008. Retrieved 2008-10-08.

• ^ "Title Search: Hedda Gabler". The Internet Movie Database. 2008. Retrieved 2008-09-18.

• Hedda Gabler at the Internet Broadway Database• Hedda Gabler at the Internet off-Broadway Database• "A Lesbian Interpretation of Hedda Gabler" review by Toby

Zinman for the Philadelphia Inquirer of an alternative production of the play by Mauckingbird Theatre Company