Ibsen's play, The Wild Duck immerses us in a web of human fraility so affecting that even today, over a century after it was written, we still have a Ibsen's play, The Wild Duck immerses us in a web of human fraility so affecting that even today, over a century after it was written, we still have a visceral reaction to its characters.
The plot is simple. Gregers Werle, after an absence of 17 years, returns to his family home and renews his friendship with Hjalmar Ekdal. Hjalmar had fallen on hard times due to an illegal forestry cutting scheme for which Hjalmar's father old Ekdal went to prison. Old Ekdal was Gregers' father's business partner, but the elder Werle was acquitted and emerged unscathed. The Ekdals are now a happy family. Hjalmar is married to Gina, the Werle's former housekeeper, and they have a fourteen year old daughter, Hedwig.
Gregers is an idealist. By revealing to Hjalmar that Gina was his father's cast-off mistress, he believes the marriage will be freed from what he calls a mire of lies and ascend to a state of radiant perfection. However, his disclosure also contributes to Hjalmar's conclusion that Hedvig is the illegitimate daughter of old Werle, and he declares that he will leave both Gina and Hedwig.
We readily understand that Gregers' idealism is untethered from reality. However, Ibsen also leads us to a complexity that resonates with contemporary sensibilities. Truth is intertwined with other moral values like trust, kindness, and empathy. It requires little thought to understand that a truth can do as much damage as a lie, or that time can shift the implications of both.
Ibsen also opens up a psychological landscape with his many ambiguities. Clearly the elder Werle has committed despicable acts. His philandering caused his wife much anguish. He leveraged his social position and wealth to compromise Gina. His business success is built on illegal activities for which old Ekdal, his business partner, suffered imprisonment and disgrace. He manipulated Hjalmar with his money and feigned solicitude into marrying Gina and setting up shop as a photographer. Yet, his motives are never really made clear. Was he really worried that Gina was carrying his illegitimate child? Is it impossible to imagine that he was suffering pangs of conscience in his dotage?
Gregers' idealism, on closer examination, is also not pure. He blames his father for his mother's suffering and admits he knew, or at least strongly suspected, old Ekdal had been found guilty for what was a jointly committed crime, but failed to confront his father out of fear. On that basis we may suspect his obsession with the truth is merely a tool for both exacting revenge and as recompense for his youthful feelings of impotence.
Ibsen's play has been characterized by many as a tragi-comedy. The comedy, however, is most effectively conveyed through irony. Gregers makes much of his independence. However, in the room he has let he cannot even light the stove without starting a conflagration which he extinguishes by flooding the room. He leaves it for others to clean the mess up. Throughout the play Gregers has been contending that total truth is the sole basis for what he calls the perfect marriage. However, the only candidate for this perfection is the pending marriage between the father he despises and Mrs. Sörby after she asserts that she and old Werle have disclosed all secrets to each other. Only Hjalmar, certainly no intellectual powerhouse, grasps the irony before equivocating about its significance.
As for the tragedy, it is so profound it leaves us numbed. We are forced to reassess how we got there. There are two main characters, Gregers and Hjalmal. However, neither can be said to be tragic. Instead, the tragedy derives from their relationship to Hedwig. Hjalmar is so light-weight that according to Dr. Relling he has no personality. He accepts Hedwig's idolization like an entitlement and is willing to cast her aside after Gregers' disclosure. Gregers has listened to the expressions of imagination from a sensitive innocent child and returned that trust by off-loading the responsibility for fixing a situation he has created. His drivel about the grand gesture and the purity of sacrifice negate any sympathy or admiration we might have thought his due. It is actually the alcoholic grandfather old Ekdal who displays an emotional sympathy with Hedwig. It was through his efforts that the beloved wild duck was procured and his solicitous regard for her love of the bird has a touching innocence of its own.
For all his fine talk, it is Gregers who refuses to face the truth by maintaining that Hedwig's death was an accident. Dr. Relling knows better and bluntly tells him so. It's one truth that we can endorse wholeheartedly.
Despite all that has happened, Gregers still casts himself as a hero, the one person unafraid to enlighten others by speaking the truth. He dismisses Relling's accusation that his meddling has caused irreparable damage, declaring he has found his calling. He seizes on an earlier metaphor, the 13th at the table, employed in the beginning of the play to mean bad luck, and believes he has converted it to mean the one who will call out lies. His destiny, he declares is “to be the thirteenth at the table.” He is oblivious to the Biblical allusion to the thirteenth apostle, Judas the betrayer. His valediction is declared with such smug self-congratulatory confidence, it beggars an appropriate response. In R. Farquharson Sharp's translation, Relling can only say, So I should imagine.” James McFarland's translation has Relling's response as, “The devil it is.” I have to admit I'm partial to Robert Brustein's adaptation in which Relling spits “Oh, fuck you!”
NOTES: I viewed the the 1984 version starring Jeremy Irons, Liv Ullman, Arthur Dignan, Rys McConnachie,and Lucinda Jones (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CiRy7...) and a 1971 version starring Denholm Elliot the link to which I can no longer find. I also read the three editions mentioned in my review for comparison. This is the selection for the month of our local book club....more
Pygmalion, written in 1912, satirizes English society from multiple angles. One of Shaw's cleverest and most overlooked characters in achieving this ePygmalion, written in 1912, satirizes English society from multiple angles. One of Shaw's cleverest and most overlooked characters in achieving this effect is Alfred Doolittle, Eliza's silver-tongued father. When Higgins surmises Doolittle is a habitue of his local pub, Doolittle characterizes it as “the poor man's club.” When Higgins demands Doolittle assume his parental responsibilities and take Eliza back, Doolittle adroitly plays the gender card: “Listen here, Governor. You and me is men of the world, ain't we?” Higgins accuses Doolittle of having no morals. Doolittle's unabashed defense: “Can't afford them, Governor.” He goes on to recite the entitlements owed him by society for his status as a member of the “undeserving poor.” His affable effrontery articulated so logically impress Higgins. Here is a candidate even more promising than Eliza. In three months he could be a shoo-in for a Cabinet seat or a Welsh pulpit. Doolittle demurs. Contrary to the shame society tries to force on him, he embraces his status in life, he declares. All of this is a set-up to the events that befall him in Act V.
Shaw upbraided the audiences of the day for desiring a happy romantic ending to his play, i.e. a marriage between Higgins and Eliza. In an epilogue he proposes that Eliza should marry Freddy Eynsford Hill. It is an interesting proposition in that Freddy is usually portrayed as the wimpy sop of his sister's bullying and derision. Yet, a different interpretation might present him as a man resigned to holding his tongue and preserving a “gentlemanly” mien. He obviously is not too bright, but we have no way of knowing if a change in living situation might instill in him more self-confidence. In any case, Shaw insists that Freddy is the perfect match for Eliza. She is clever; he is not. She is assertive; he is accommodating. She has low class origins; he is deemed “respectable.” Given Shaw's persuasive logic, one must ask why audiences continue to harbor a wish to see Eliza and Higgins wed, particularly in an age sensitive to asymmetric power dynamics. Would we see Higgins as manipulative if he had reciprocated Eliza's incipient emotional attachment? The one attraction that Higgins has is that he is interesting. For all his contempt for convention and claims of emotional distance, that one strength is a powerful lure, even in our feminist-conscious contemporary society. What is easy to overlook is that Higgins has no capacity for growth or sharing. He admits that Eliza has a better ear than he does for sounds, but views that as a threat rather than a connection.
Higgins' and to a lesser degree Pickering's tragedies are their complacency with the present. Pickering even urges Eliza to return to their household. After all, they can still be friends, and he has taken a somewhat paternal interest in Eliza's welfare. He has the optimistic view that things will eventually sort themselves out. We, however, know that in a scant two years World War I will destroy the world as they know it.
Present-day productions of the play wrestle with maintaining its relevance. It's an interesting problem. The swipes at class relations, gender inequality and hypocrisy are embedded in Shaw's entertaining wit. His message is too easily subverted by its Victorian setting, something exploited by the brilliant musical adaptation, My Fair Lady. I was interested to learn Peter Hinton directed a version with a contemporary setting in the 2015 Shaw Festival.
I read this play because it was the selection of our local book club.
Very interesting interview with director Peter Hinton's ideas about theater, with mention of his production of Pygmalion: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mg5g3...
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