The Pelican: Analysis of Major Characters
"The Pelican: Analysis of Major Characters" explores the complex dynamics within a lower-class Swedish family, focusing on the interactions and motivations of its central characters. The Mother, Elise, embodies a paradox of self-proclaimed motherhood, masking her indulgent lifestyle while her children suffer. Despite her claims of love, she manipulates and disregards her family's needs. Her son, Fredrik, is deeply affected by this upbringing, grappling with cynicism and despair over his future as a law student amidst his mother's toxicity. Gerda, the frail daughter, struggles with her own sense of identity and self-worth, ultimately awakening to the harsh realities of her life and aligning with her brother. The Son-in-Law, Axel, is portrayed as a self-serving opportunist, whose initial affection for Gerda fades as he turns his attention toward the more commanding Mother, highlighting themes of greed and betrayal. Lastly, Margaret, the family cook, offers a perspective of truth and resilience, revealing her awareness of the family's dysfunction while contemplating her escape. This character analysis provides a rich understanding of the emotional and relational complexities within the family unit, setting the stage for deeper exploration of their individual journeys and conflicts.
The Pelican: Analysis of Major Characters
Author: August Strindberg
First published: Pelikanen, 1907 (English translation, 1962)
Genre: Play
Locale: Indeterminate, but probably Sweden
Plot: Mythic
Time: The early 1900's
The Mother, Elise, a newly widowed matriarch of a lower-class Swedish household. The Mother considers herself a model of motherhood because of the self-sacrifices she has endured on behalf of her husband and children. Actually, however, her life is a fabric of lies intended to conceal her own extravagance and indulgence. She has eaten well and kept warm while her children have virtually starved and frozen. She does not deny this history to herself, yet she shows no remorse and continues to insist on a frugality that perpetuates hunger and ill health. She is suspicious and defensive, quick to judge or blame others. She demands obedience and attention and is ready to fight for them. The Mother claims to love her children, yet she manipulates them and treats them with contempt. The only person she trusts is her Son-in-Law, but that trust is based on a mercenary complicity, and she even takes pride in having stolen his attentions from her daughter. Supposedly in mourning for her husband—whom she knows she drove to his death—she cannot stand the smell of the funeral flowers and imagines his ghost to be present as the wind rocks his chair.
The Son, Fredrik, a law student. The Son is a hungry and delicate young man because of the deprivations of his childhood. He is unhappy and racked with coughing and stammering. Basically practical-minded, he hopes to finish his education and become a lawyer, but his ambition is hollow because he has lost all faith in the legal system, and now that his father's estate proves to be worthless, he despairs of ever earning his degree. The Son has no illusions about the Mother, his parents' marriage, and his own upbringing, and he is overwhelmingly cynical about human relationships. Just as a hellish marriage led his father to the taverns and eventually to his death, so do the Son's contempt for life, humanity, community, and himself lead him to drinking as his only escape.
The Daughter, Gerda, a frail young newlywed. Because of disease and poor nutrition in childhood, she is underdeveloped and, she reveals to her mother, barren. She has just married the Son-in-Law and is devoted to him to the point of excessive jealousy, for deep down she knows that his passion for her is completely a sham. This, like many truths of her life, she chooses to deny. The Daughter is, by her own confession, a sleepwalker through life. She wants to stay ignorant, so she continues to believe in the sacredness of motherhood and to defend the Mother against the Son's accusations. When forced to face the truth, she allies with her brother and becomes much more powerful and articulate, even pointedly sardonic.
The Son-in-Law, Axel, a lieutenant who has just married the Daughter. The Son-in-Law is a scoundrel, an intelligent man with a consuming greed and a basic disregard for others. He does not indulge in pretenses but shrewdly calculates his way through situations. He courted and married the Daughter for her inheritance; at best, he is indifferent to her. Once he discovered the mother to be infinitely stronger and more interesting, he befriended her, and they quickly became intimates, causing the final deterioration of her marriage. Now that the father's estate offers no financial reward, however, the Son-in-Law assumes a position of authority and becomes cruel and contemptuous toward the Mother.
Margaret, the cook, who has been with the family for years. She sees the truth and is willing to accuse and provoke the Mother with it, though she stops short of full-scale confrontation. She has heard too many lies, has felt like a prisoner with this family too long, and is ready to leave.