Tragic Heroism in Rosmersholm

Tragic Heroism in Rosmersholm JOHN S. CHAMBERLAIN • IN THE INTERPRETATION OF ROSMERSHOLM considerable emphasis has been placed upon the ideas of expiation and atonement and upon the complementary theme of a conflict between pagan and Christian forces in the play reminiscent of that in Emperor and Galilean. 1 In terms of mood, the work has been long and generally regarded as exalted and tragic. William Archer, for instance, writes of the play's "complex yet clear and stately harmony,,2 and Muriel Bradbrook remarks that "Architecturally Ibsen never produced anything so harmonious: it is his most Sophoclean play.,,3 It is certainly true that the play continually evokes an elevated mood appropriate to the dignity of tragedy, and that its structure is generally suitable for the presentation of the kinds of heroic action already defined. Less often noted, however, is that both Rosmer and Rebekka are invested with ironic identities which function as a sardonic commentary on the high seriousness of their tragic roles and which run counter to the tragic enactment by strongly suggesting the ultimate implausibility of certain conventional kinds of heroic conduct in a nineteenth -century context. Ibsen took specific and common (though by no means universal or especially valid) assumptions about the nature of the tragic hero and used them in two ways. At one level they provide the basis for a tragic essay in a RomantiC mode already employed in some of his early work. At another and deeper level, they are used in the formation of a sustained ironic element which both ridicules Romantic heroism and makes possible some forceful implications about contemporary society. The moral judgements evident in the ironic appraisal of characters are of scathing intensity but they are not simply destructive. They expose moral sterility but they also hint at a measure of hope for the future of European societies. Rosmersholm rejects certain forms of tragic heroism as anachronistic and simultaneously 277 278 JOHN S. CHAMBERLAIN hints at the value of the unsensational pursuit of truth by the determined individualist: some of its fundamental implications accordingly foreshadow the themes of The Lady from the Sea and Little Eyolf in both of which central characters achieve a measure of maturity in contexts which noticeably lack a tragic metaphysic and texture. What might be termed the double identities of Rosmer and Rebekka are of crucial significance to the development of this approach to the play. Rosmer is both the last scion of a noble house, a figure of archetypal proportions, and simultaneously a reserved, indecisive dreamer frequently shown in full flight from the social, political and personal difficulties he encounters. Rebekka is both the high-minded Viking woman inspiring the man she loves to mighty deeds and valiantly struggling against the corrosive effects which Christian ideology has upon her and a representative of the typical femme de trente ans, a pathetic victim terrified by the social stigmas which threaten her and scheming to attain the apparent security of marriage into an upper-class family. It is as though Rosmer and Rebekka are composite figures who recall both the striking characteristics of some of Ibsen's early Romantic creations and those of his more ironically conceived Naturalistic characters. Like Brendel, who in many ways embodies the spirit of the play, they can, in imagination at least, scale the heights of a Romantic world where golden dreams descend upon them, or, figuratively at least, find themselves closer to the gutter to which Brendel is hurled by his ungrateful auditors in the public house. Rosmer has the high-souled sense of honour of a Sigurd, but he lacks common sense as much as Gregers Werle, whose impractical passion for ideals he shares. He has, like Earl Skule, the sense of being called to fulfil a great mission as well as something of the latter's capacity for anguish, but, as with Consul Bernick, his noblest gestures have another side which looks suspiciously like face-saving. And his attachment to genealogical research recalls Georg Tesman's pedantic devotion to his study of the domestic industries of medieval Brabant as much as Peer Gynt's poetic descriptions of his family's former grandeur. For her part, Rebekka has...