The Concept Of Manuscript In Hedda Gabler By Henrik Ibsen

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In his play Hedda Gabler, Ibsen connects the four main characters of Hedda, Lovborg, Tesman and Mrs Elvsted through the creation, destruction and attempted recreation of the manuscript. The manuscript represents a connection of mutual growth between Thea Elvsted and Eilert Lovborg, the contrast between Lovborg’s genius and Tesman’s banality, and the destructive relationship between Hedda and Lovborg. Partly through its narrative circulation, between these characters, the manuscript comes to represent the play’s central theme of defiance against the norms of the nineteenth-century.

Hedda and Lovborg are both opposed to social norms and modern life. The act of Hedda burning the manuscript shows Hedda’s destruction and desperation for control. This also shows Hedda’s negative characteristics like cold-hearted, dishonest, cunning and easily annoyed. Her anger and jealousy that fuels the burning of the manuscript also leads her to stage-manage Lovborg’s suicide. Hedda is jealous that Thea is creative and can inspire Tesman and Lovborg and so Hedda’s power diminishes within the presence of Thea. Hedda did not have control over the outside world, and now she has diminished control over the inside of the Tesman Villa. The act of Hedda actively manipulating Lovborg towards his suicide gives her the feeling of control. The proposed recreation of the manuscript acts as a surrogate child for Lovborg and Thea, using Tesman’s talents as a collector and arranger of knowledge for public consumption, rather than as a creator of ideas. When Hedda realises that Thea and Tesman, together recovering the manuscript, she sees the image of the rebirth of the child she has just destroyed and realises that she can no longer stop the manuscript from coming back to life. Her husband would dedicate his life to the reconstruction of the work, which is both an affront to Hedda’s grand gestures of destruction, and a reminder of Tesman’s perfect suitability to the kind of second-hand life that the aristocratic Hedda Gabler abhors. As Lovborg tells Hedda he had lost the manuscript, Hedda sees this as a last chance to influence Lovborg’s destiny. Hedda sees suicide as the ultimate control over someone’s life. Since she cannot create anything beautiful, she must destroy something precious. She gives Lovborg one of her father’s pistols with the intent that Lovborg would use it in his suicide. By doing this, Hedda extends her power and influence as the pistol is a symbol for control; and for their youthful time, they spend in General Gabler’s home. Just as the manuscript represents Lovborg’s influence that he has in the world, the antique pistols signify the one direct method open to Hedda for asserting her personality on the world around her. Ironically, and in keeping with their effective symbolism of women’s subordination to male power in the world, they are not, unlike Lovborg’s writing, intrinsic to Hedda, but another sign of her father’s influence over her. Lovborg attempted giving up drinking to return to society with his manuscript and to prove he has self-control. Part of the manuscript’s symbolism resides in the fact that it is a manuscript – something written in the authentic hand of an individual, not a published work appearing in multiple copies for just anyone to read. It helps the ‘drama’ of being the sole copy when it goes missing, but Ibsen is interested in the creative individual who struggles against the pressures of social conformity. Lövborg’s tendency towards dissolute behaviour – linked to the vine leaves symbol – is associated with his imaginative capacity, but it is still a weakness he does initially try to control. Lövborg’s lack of self-control and failed attempt to regain social standing caused him to lose the manuscript, partly due to Hedda’s manipulation of him into betraying his vow of sobriety. The manuscript itself promises to redeem Lövborg of his past disgrace, as well as to establish him with a bright reputation in the future. Lövborg’s lack of self-control, coupled with Hedda’s destructive nature, lead to the loss and fiery death of this child. “Now I’m burning your child, Thea! With your curly hair! Your child and Ejlert Lovborg’s. I’m burning…burning your child.” (Ibsen 246).

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The conception of the manuscript in itself represents Lovborg’s and Thea’s power of creation and is the only creative relationship in the play. Thea is characterised as an ‘earth goddess’ type – through the synecdoche of hair and onomastics of her Christian name (in Greek, Thea means Goddess; godly – the mythological Thea was Greek goddess of light and mother of the sun, moon and dawn) – associated with creativity and inspiration, particularly as Lovborg’s muse. In this latter aspect, she replaced Hedda, who inspired Lovborg’s passion in their youth. Hedda’s ability to influence others is manipulative and destructive, Thea’s, creative. The fact that a woman plays a guiding hand in the creation of the manuscript proves a step towards the future of different social norms, as in the present time of the play, it was unconventional to have a woman do such work. This is also the case as Thea has a willingness to risk social censure by leaving her husband to follow and protect Lovborg from himself. As the two have come together for its conception, it is often regarded as their child. Thea responds to Lovborg’s act of “tearing up the manuscript”, by telling him that he has permanently hurt her and that she will resent him for “the rest of life”. The degree of Thea’s outburst shows how close Lovborg and Thea truly were; as the manuscript was like their child, they had a relationship similar to that of husband and wife. Thea considers her relationship with Lovborg dead as the life of the manuscript is over and, in her mind, there is nothing to live for without Lovborg’s manuscript. After Thea leaves in tears, Lovborg confesses to Hedda that he had lost the manuscript. Hedda asks Lovborg what he wants to do now, and he replies that he will “put an end to it” by killing himself.

The two, Lovborg and Tesman, are rivals for a prestigious professorship with their professions alone show the contrast between Lovborg’s genius and Tasman’s banality, as Tesman studies past obsolete creations and Lovborg is a visionary. Tesman is a holder of a University Fellowship in cultural history and specialises in medieval domestic crafts. Lovborg is a visionary historian and sociologist and wants to control the world by seeing into its future. Tesman is amiable, and a hard worker and is considered to be an outstanding member of society. He is generally regarded as dull, conventional and mediocre, as when he talks of his studies, he goes on about the mundane details. As the play progresses, Tesman finds himself challenged by Judge Brack for a job and becomes increasingly worried about debt. As a result, Tesman begins to deny Hedda objects such as pianos and horses leading Hedda’s sphere of influence to decrease further as socialising is one of her methods of manipulation and control. With Tesman losing the ability to satisfy Hedda, she states that she only has one pastime. Tesman gets excited as he believes this pastime is about an unborn child, but Hedda is instead referring to her father’s pistols, a symbol partly representing Hedda’s destruction. Hedda tells Tesman that she has destroyed Lovborg’s manuscript which he had found, leaving Tesman angry with her. Hedda calms her husband by telling him that she had done it for his sake, as he had been jealous of Lovborg, his work and his manuscript. Tesman, somewhat comforted but still upset, has Hedda admit to him that she is pregnant for the first time in the play, overriding his anger with delight showing how easily he can be manipulated. Hedda was now stuck in social norms as a wife and mother which she despises. Furthermore, Hedda despises the idea that she has to pretend to love Tesman in order to protect herself. Hedda now must submit to the banal clichéd role of caring woman, the domesticated wife. The ironic association between the destruction of Eilert and Thea’s ‘love child’, and Hedda having to take on the real role of mother. In one sense, it confirms her defeat of Thea’s influence, but in another it reaffirms Thea’s superiority over Hedda in having rejected that conventional feminine role and contrasting Thea’s power of the great Lovborg, and Hedda’s matrimonial subordination to the petty Tesman.

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