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A review by libellum_aphrodite
Ghosts by Henrik Ibsen
3.0
I first learned of “Ghosts” from Chesterton’s unabashed displeasure with the play and its author in [b:Heretics|612143|Heretics|G.K. Chesterton|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1416873240s/612143.jpg|1884008]. Chesterton proclaims Ibsen's main shortcoming is his incomplete ethical stance: he has no problem exposing evil, but fails to portray goodness.
"Ibsen does not profess to know how how virtue and happiness are brought about, in the sense that he professes to know how our modern sexual tragedies are brought about."
"There is no ideal man of Ibsen."
[Here come the spoilers.] For Acts 1 and 2, Ibsen does appear to hint at a stance on what is good. Mrs. Alving exposes the lies and hypocrisy of the presumably “respectable,” officially married, aristocracy at length. In contrast, Oswald describes the lives of the artists in Paris; despite their “sham-marriages,” they pose a tantalizing picture of love, respect, and happiness that eludes the families with the proper paperwork for their relationship.
But, alas, Ibsen snatches the goodness and joy away in short order in Act 3. The two characters with any hope of salvation from this cycle, Oswald and Regine, both fall as well as their elders. Despite no “reckless living” for Oswald, a brain illness, attributed to “the sins of fathers [being] visited upon the children,” smites him down. His last wish before losing his mind is just that someone please kill him out of mercy instead of having a comatose life. When Regine learns that she is the illegitimate daughter of Mr. Alving, instead of the legitimate daughter of the equally awful Mr. Engstrand, she exclaims, “Still, what the hell …! What difference does it make!” and storms out to work at her false father's new brothel for seamen, a career path she was adamantly against at the play’s opening scene. This felt almost as if Tess of the D’Urbervilles, in all of the messed up revelations and propositions that came her way, had just said “Fuck it. Why not?”
In conclusion, Chesterton nailed it; or, as Scott summed it up, “It’s assholes all the way down.”
"Ibsen does not profess to know how how virtue and happiness are brought about, in the sense that he professes to know how our modern sexual tragedies are brought about."
"There is no ideal man of Ibsen."
[Here come the spoilers.] For Acts 1 and 2, Ibsen does appear to hint at a stance on what is good. Mrs. Alving exposes the lies and hypocrisy of the presumably “respectable,” officially married, aristocracy at length. In contrast, Oswald describes the lives of the artists in Paris; despite their “sham-marriages,” they pose a tantalizing picture of love, respect, and happiness that eludes the families with the proper paperwork for their relationship.
But, alas, Ibsen snatches the goodness and joy away in short order in Act 3. The two characters with any hope of salvation from this cycle, Oswald and Regine, both fall as well as their elders. Despite no “reckless living” for Oswald, a brain illness, attributed to “the sins of fathers [being] visited upon the children,” smites him down. His last wish before losing his mind is just that someone please kill him out of mercy instead of having a comatose life. When Regine learns that she is the illegitimate daughter of Mr. Alving, instead of the legitimate daughter of the equally awful Mr. Engstrand, she exclaims, “Still, what the hell …! What difference does it make!” and storms out to work at her false father's new brothel for seamen, a career path she was adamantly against at the play’s opening scene. This felt almost as if Tess of the D’Urbervilles, in all of the messed up revelations and propositions that came her way, had just said “Fuck it. Why not?”
In conclusion, Chesterton nailed it; or, as Scott summed it up, “It’s assholes all the way down.”