The Wild Duck

A detailed Summary of The Wild Duck

The Wild Duck, written by Henry Ibsen is a story of two families, the Werles and Ekdals. The Ekdals are poor; Haakon Werle has ruined Old Ekdal in business. The young, idealistic Gregers, son of Haakon Werle comes to stay with the Ekdals after a quarrel with his father. He is aware, though the Ekdals are not, that Gina, wife of his contemporary Hjalmar Ekdal, was previously his father's mistress and that is why Hjalmar was provided with the funds to enable him to set himself up as a photographer. He reveals his knowledge, for he believes that no true marriage can be based on a lie as this one has been, and this causes the destruction of the household. The play ends in tragedy, for Hialmar destroys himself. He is unable to forgive Gina for having been Werle's mistress and repulses Hedvig's affectionate advances because he thinks she is Werle's daughter. Hedvig, who adores her father, cannot bear his rejection. She, therefore, shoots herself in order to prove her love for her him. Hialmar is repentant for his actions, but it is too late; the tragic damage is done.

It's hard to say whether the decision they made was ethical or not. There are two ways to look at the story. If you look at the outcome of the play it has its advanta

ges (ethical) and disadvantages (unethical). The ethical aspect of the play was that everyone found out the truth but they found out the hard way and the hard isn't always confronting. Things seemed to have gotten more messed up when Gregers decided to go against his father. He wanted to prove that his father was back stabber and a liar. The advantage isn't so bad because the characters became aware of who they were dealing with. The unethical portion of the play was Gregers getting back at his father, because in the long run he hurt other people as well as his father. Gregers indirectly put the notion into Hedvig's head that she should kill herself in order to make everything better. Gregers did this by using the duck as an analogy. The reason why he used the duck was because he knew that Hedvig was able to relate to the duck and he mentioned to her that she should "prove her love to her father by killing the duck". Now this is unethical because Gregers is using reverse psychology. He may not have actually known that she was going to kill herself but he did have a part in it. He toyed with her mind.

This all could have been avoided if everyone used moral judgment. For instance in the beginning of the play Werles could of brought his son to the side and tell him what was going on and explain to his son how much love he has for his future wife. Gregers was also wrong in trying to get back at his father by having everyone confess what he or she did wrong. Whatever happened in the past was everyone's own business. There shouldn't have been any reason for the characters to confess. They were all happy and satisfied with what was going on in his or her life except for Gregers because he felt cheated.

There are many ethical issues in this play. One of them for instance is whether the whole idea of keeping secrets from everyone. Gina never confesses to her husband Hialmar that his daughter isn't

Some common words found in the essay are:
Gina Werle's, Hakon Werles, Ekdal Hialmar, Absolutism Gregers, Hjalmar Ekdal, Gregers Maybe, Absolutism Kant's, Ekdals Werles, Haakon Werle, Hialmar's Ekdal's, rational absolutism, utilitarianism theory, haakon werle, prove love, hakon werles, gregers using, situation outcome, beginning play,

Approximate Word count = 1285
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English