Hedda Gabler

The character Hedda of the play Hedda Gabler written by Henrik Ibsen during the Realism and Symbolism period foreshadows the Character who portrays the Stepdaughter in Luigi Pirandello’s Six Characters In Search Of an Author written during the Modernism period. Hedda and the Stepdaughter are evil, diabolical and dangerous characters. Both Henrik Ibsen and Luigi Pirandello have managed to establish a hate and sympathy relationship between their characters, Hedda and the Stepdaughter, and the readers. Although Hedda and the Stepdaughter possess evil hearts the reader can easily feel a sense of sympathy for them. These two characters endure the pressure of society which forces them to confirm to the norm in fear of being alienated from society. Hedda lives in her father shadow; she is General Gabler’s daughter and she is accustomed to enjoying the finer things in life. She marries down and is forced to live a life in which she is not accustomed to. These inner pressures and conflicts have destroyed her individuality. Hedda resorts to shooting her fathers’ pistols to let off steam. She also threatens to shoot Judge Brack “Now, Judge Brack, I am going to shoot you” (1429).
The Stepdaughter in Six Characters In Search Of an Author also possesses the same evil traits. She is so distraught over having to prostitute herself out in order to take care of her family until she is out for revenge. She wants her story told so bad that she is willing to sacrifice her younger sister and brother. Knowing that her little brother had a gun she pushes him behind the tree so he can kill himself and she covers her little sister in the fountain so she can drown herself. The reader feels a cross between hate and sympathy for her. The fact that she goes to this extent to get revenge is sad. She feels that she has suffered the worst of the humiliation and pain in the family and she need to humiliate the family by getting the story told just to get revenge. This is one of the characteristic