Hedda Knowledge organiser

Question 1

What did Ibsen experiment with in his plays?

Answer 1

Socially challenging ideas
- Nature of love
- Love and family responsibility 
- The impact of entrenched social morality on the 
   individual and community

Question 2

What did Ibsen focus on later in his career?

Answer 2

Focused more explicitly on

• Psychological conflict
• Conflict created around strong dynamic women trapped in society’s expectations of them.

Question 3

What is Hedda as play?

Answer 3

• Very modern for its time
• Tension between the gentile role they were expected to play in society and the darker forces which drives the human soul.

Question 4

What is the style of Hedda?

Answer 4

• Naturalistic
• Real life
• Characters motivation should be driven by heredity and environment.
• Realistic single setting
• Natural acting style
• Things happen as a result of context
• Psychological impulses of the character drive the central actions of the play.
• Elements of Tragedy
• Humour and comedy

Question 5

Who creates the elements of tragedy?

Answer 5

There are elements of tragedy in the doomed nature of the love affair between Loevborg and Thea and in the masochistic nature of Loevborg himself.

Question 6

Who is a tool for creating humour and comedy?

Answer 6

George is a tool for creating humour and comedy, His lack of awareness of Hedda’s cruelty and indifference towards him creates comic impact.

Question 7

What is the form and structure of Hedda?

Answer 7

• Divided into 4 acts
• Taking place in a single location over a day and a half
• It follows Aristotelian Unities of time place and structure
• Audience encouraged to suspend their disbelief by looking through a window into a real world and tracking the effects which unfold during the time

Question 8

Who is hedda as a character?

Answer 8

Hedda is an anti-hero with her erratic and pernicious behaviour suggesting her central flaw is multi layered.

Question 9

What were the Norwegian politics and society like at the time?

Answer 9

Early 19th century there was severe poverty and mass starvation
Norway was passed between sweden and Denmark
After industrial revolution communities stabilised and prospered
Norway’s first political party (liberal) formed 1884