Analysis_of_Scene_from_Hedda_Gabler

How might the audience respond to the characters at different points' How do the characters contrast against and react to each other' In this scene from the play, Hedda Gabler by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, the audience is brought into keen awareness of the title character's problematic relationship with the surroundings she finds herself in. Hedda's dissatisfaction with her environment grows increasingly obvious, as her exchanges with the other two characters are shown to be filled with unspoken friction, and the contrast between her aristocratic background and their bourgeois values is further highlighted through the interactions of the characters, the stage directions, and the characters' relationships with their environmental objects. Hedda finds the setting that marriage has placed her in unnatural, as she is of a higher class, and hence status, than the Tesmans. The portrait of Hedda's father, General Gabler, frames the action of the scene as it is visibly hung in the Tesmans' drawing room. In this way, the audience is alerted to the contrasting social status and values of the Gablers, as generals are members of the aristocracy in Norwegian society. The presence of his portrait is incongruent with the glaringly puritanical, middle-class setting of the Tesmans' home (the set is littered with decorations mostly preferred by the middle-class, such as the 'whatnots'), and lends itself as a symbol of the military-aristocratic world which Hedda has been removed from, simply by virtue of her marriage to Tesman. Hedda is clearly aware of this incongruence and rendered deeply frustrated by it, thus resulting in her unyielding condescension to Tesman and his aunt, despite – or perhaps even because of – their repeated efforts to please her. At certain points in the scene, the audience may grow sympathetic to the Tesmans as Hedda's lines are fraught with hostile subtext. Indeed, one may find more meaning in the implicit, rather than explicit, significances of her speech. For instance, “But then Miss Tesman one has always to get used to new things. Bit by bit.” is Hedda's cold, subtle way of indicating she is not welcome in her new home, and that she finds herself alienated by her inimical surroundings. Her resistance to the Tesman household is further emphasised by her constant movements across the stage (from the left of the back room, to the right-hand whatnot, to the stove and so on), which mirror her uneasy process of adjustment. This is in contrast to Tesman's continued attempts to physically tail her around the stage, producing an almost comical effect as he so desperately tries to seek an attention that she will not give. The audience may again respond with sympathy to the Tesmans, when Hedda's frigid nature is drawn into stark contrast with Miss Tesman's arguably warmer character, through the two characters' differing responses to the lighting (Hedda is repulsed by the “flood of sunlight”) and Hedda's distaste of the flowers (“All these blessed flowers.”). Yet as the play progresses, the audience may respond to the same character quite differently, as they are alerted to the foolish, almost irritating nature of Tesman, and start seeing Hedda painted in the contrasting light of being the victim, rather than perpetrator in this situation. This perhaps is best illustrated when Tesman bathetically reveals a present of his old house slippers received from Miss Tesman, expecting Hedda to react with a similar sense of excitement. The audience is made to feel a sense of suspense (“Of course, dear, what is it'”), which is brought crashing down by Tesman's anti-climactic statement (“My old house shoes!”), thus possibly prompting an audience reaction alienated – alongside Hedda – by such preoccupation with the inconsequential. Such an action is testimony to Tesman's naïve assumption that he and his new wife share many things in common, when in truth reality is quite the opposite. His nervous unconscious habits (the constant repetition of 'eh'') and his repeated, futile attempts at pleasing Hedda by addressing her in his speech almost every other line (“That's a good one, Hedda!”; “My slippers, Hedda!”; “Here, just take a look at them, Hedda!”) are shown to be grating to her, as she reacts with prolonged indifference, with clipped, brief and cutting replies (“Thank you, they wouldn't appeal to me”). Watching the play, one is more inclined to be sympathetic to Hedda's alienation, as neither of the other two characters truly understand the roots of her hostility, railing at a world that is not listening to her. When Hedda makes the comment about Miss Tesman's hat, in the hinging moment of the scene, the audience is given a glimpse of her ability to manipulate those around her; she makes a reference to an “old hat” that she claims to assume to be the maid's, yet when it is revealed that said hat actually belongs to Miss Tesman, she makes minimal effort to retract her statement, much less apologise. Tesman reacts in a somewhat shocked manner (“that...that's Auntie Julie's hat!”), only to be sharply contrasted with Hedda's cold and cutting reply of “Is it'”. To aggravate the tension, she later states that she “really didn't look at it so very closely”, hinting at a subtext that she finds the hat deeply unremarkable and substandard. Thus throughout the length of this entire scene, the audience is forced to respond to Hedda in more ways than one, highlighting her elusive and deeply complex nature; she is not easily and straightforwardly shown to be either a victim or a fiend, and the audience's perception is likely to oscillate between the two. Tesman and his aunt seem to be united in their attitudes and values, and while it is unlikely that this is to be read as them 'ganging up' on Hedda, it points towards Hedda's intense sense of oppression in a climate that she finds unambiguously and entirely foreign. There is also the sense of a triangular relationship, with one character standing in contrast to the other two at any point in time. Arguably, said character is most often Hedda, with her repeated attempts to push the other two away. The audience is thus made aware of two polarising forces; an observation more universal than the reading of them as merely individual characters. The second conflict in the scene arises from Tesman's references to Hedda being pregnant (“I declare she's filled out beautifully on the trip”); while he is unaware of the significance of this observation, both Hedda and Miss Tesman are. Once again, two vastly different reactions emerge – Miss Tesman, originally intending to leave after her humiliation over the hat incident, stops to kiss Hedda's hair and bless her as she rejoices over this discovery; Hedda on the other hand, is curt (“I'm exactly the same as I was when we left”) and visibly recoils at the prospect of motherhood, trying to free herself from Miss Tesman's embrace and also the metaphoric grasp of pregnancy. Being a mother represents an additional source of frustration for Hedda, as she is so deeply dissatisfied with her environment that she has no wish to further perpetuate it by producing an offspring that will only serve as a reminder of her oppression. The tension in the room is brought to a peak by Miss Tesman's declaration of “Every single day I'll come and visit you both.”, as this foreshadows what lies ahead; the audience senses that Hedda's unwanted pregnancy, and her hostility to the Tesmans, will likely be a key source of conflict throughout the play that is unlikely to be resolved easily.