Rosmersholm by Henrik Ibsen

First produced: 1887; first published, 1886 (English translation, 1889)

Type of work: Drama

Type of plot: Social realism

Time of plot: Mid-nineteenth century

Locale: A small coastal town in western Norway

Principal characters

• Johannes Rosmer, a former clergyman
• Rebecca West, his friend
• Rector Kroll, the schoolmaster
• Ulric Brendel, a disillusioned liberal
• Peter Mortensgard, a publisher
• Madam Helseth, housekeeper at Rosmersholm

The Story:

Since the death of his wife, Beata, Johannes Rosmer turns more and more to his friend, Rebecca West. Rosmer had an unhappy marriage with an unsympathetic, neurotic wife who took her own life in a millpond. Rebecca was her friend as well as the husband’s. Beata’s brother, Rector Kroll, the schoolmaster, also is Rosmer’s close friend.

Kroll calls on Rosmer to get him to join a political drive against the new liberal party that is gaining power in the village. The party is controlled by Peter Mortensgard, publisher of the Beacon, a paper Kroll considers radical and dangerous because it criticizes the conservative party, which he represents. Kroll is disappointed to learn that Rosmer no longer holds his former static views on politics and social structures but, instead, supports the liberals. Rosmer’s real concern is not with politics at all, but only with encouraging people to ennoble their souls; he feels the new party is a step toward this goal. Rebecca supports him in his belief.

While they talk, Madam Helseth, the housekeeper, announces Ulric Brendel, a self-styled genius who is going to the village to offer his services to the liberal party. Brendel is in rags and obviously without a livelihood, and to Kroll he epitomizes the liberals. To Rosmer and Rebecca, however, Brendel is a man living and working as his conscience directs, and they help him with clothing and money.

This act turns Kroll against them. He now turns on Rosmer savagely and accuses him of betraying his class. Rosmer was a clergyman, and Kroll attempts to plead with him from a religious point of view, but Rosmer claims that he renounced the church and became a freethinker. He feels that people are growing so bitter in political struggles that they must be brought back to tolerance and good will. It is his hope that he can aid in this task by renouncing his way of life and working with the new leaders.

Kroll then accuses Rosmer of living in sin with Rebecca, even though he defended Rosmer and Rebecca when town gossips whispered about them. He accuses Rebecca of influencing Rosmer in his new attitude and suggests that she was responsible for the suicide of Rosmer’s wife. He says his sister believed that Rosmer wished to wed Rebecca, and for that reason she drowned herself. Kroll maintains he did not speak up before because he did not know that Rebecca is an emancipated woman, and he did not believe her capable of such actions. His worst thoughts about Rosmer and Rebecca are confirmed when Mortensgard appears at Rosmer’s home in answer to a note Rebecca writes him in Brendel’s behalf. When Kroll leaves, he promises to inform the town of Rosmer’s treachery.

Mortensgard comes to solicit Rosmer’s aid in the liberal cause, but when he learns that Rosmer left the church, he does not want the former clergyman’s help. He needs Christians, not freethinkers, as he himself is, and so Rosmer is left with no one to support. Mortensgard, too, slyly accuses Rosmer and Rebecca of indiscretions and of causing the death of Rosmer’s wife.

From that time on Rosmer begins to feel guilty about his part in her death and fears that he did not conceal his true feelings for Rebecca from his wife. Determined not to let the past rule his life, he asks Rebecca to marry him. She flees from him sobbing, swearing that she can never marry him, that if he ever asks her again she will die the way his wife died.

Kroll does his work well. The paper supporting his party accuses Rosmer of betraying his class to gain favor with the liberals. The article links Rebecca and Rosmer in a debasing way. Rosmer wants to fight back, if only to free people’s minds from pettiness and mass thinking, but he believes that he cannot accomplish this task because he no longer feels innocent of his wife’s death; only the innocent can lead others.

Rebecca decides to give him back his purity of conscience. In Kroll’s presence she tells Rosmer that she alone is responsible for his wife’s suicide. She says that she came to Rosmersholm for the sole purpose of converting Rosmer to the liberal party. She knows that Brendel once had great influence over Rosmer, and she hoped to renew that influence and win him to the emancipators. With victory in sight, his wife was a stumbling block. To overcome that obstacle, she made that sick woman believe that she was going to have a child by Rosmer. In desperation the wife threw herself into the millpond. Rebecca’s love for Rosmer makes her confess so that he can clear his own conscience of all guilt. Kroll and Rosmer leave her alone after her confession, and she prepares to leave Rosmersholm forever.

While she packs, Rosmer returns and tells her his old friends persuaded him that the task of ennobling people’s minds is not for him or for anyone. He tells her that he knew she used him only to attain her own goals. Then she makes her greatest confession to him. She says that she was at first moved by physical passion. She plotted to get rid of his wife. Then, after the suicide, Rebecca came to feel such deep and quiet love for Rosmer that it took her spirit from her. He ennobled her soul.

Rosmer cannot quite believe her story; he fears that she is again using him for her own purposes. As they talk, Brendel appears and tells them that he is leaving town, that his genius is gone, and he is bankrupt. He tells them, too, that Mortensgard is the only one who can win their cause, for he is without ideals. Only those without ideals can gain a victory. He says also that Rosmer can gain victory if the woman who loves him will convince him of her loyalty. After Brendel leaves them, Rosmer asks Rebecca to prove that he ennobled her soul. The price is high. He asks her to throw herself into the millpond as she caused his wife to do. Only her self-inflicted death can give him back his faith in himself, so she agrees to his plan. Since they no longer believe in a judgment after death, they must punish themselves for their love. At the last minute, Rosmer decides to join Rebecca in death. They stand with their arms entwined, then throw themselves into the pond.

Bibliography

Durbach, Errol. “Ibsen the Romantic”: Analogues of Paradise in the Later Plays. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1982. A tracing of romantic elements in Ibsen’s later plays. The section on Rosmersholm, a play that Durbach considers bleak and depressing, discusses how joy nevertheless can be found in the midst of despair.

Holtan, Orley I. Mythic Patterns in Ibsen’s Last Plays. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1970. An overview of the mythic content in Ibsen’s last seven plays. Contains a good discussion of the echoes from ancient Scandinavian mythology that can be heard in Rosmersholm.

Johnston, Brian. The Ibsen Cycle: The Design of the Plays from “Pillars of Society” to “When We Dead Awaken.” Boston: Twayne, 1975. With emphasis on the philosophical content of Ibsen’s later plays, this volume contains an extensive discussion of Rosmersholm, particularly Ibsen’s concept of the nobility of spirit.

McFarlane, James, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Ibsen. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994. Collection of essays, including discussions of Ibsen’s dramatic apprenticeship, historical drama, comedy, realistic problem drama, and working methods. The references to Rosmersholm are listed in the index.

Meyer, Michael. Ibsen: A Biography. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1971. A standard biography of Ibsen. Contains a good discussion of Rosmersholm and its place in Ibsen’s canon, in which, according to Meyer, it marks the transition from a concern with matters of society to a focus on the internal life of individuals.

Moi, Toril. “Losing Faith in Language: Fantasies of Perfect Communication in Rosmersholm.” In Henrik Ibsen and the Birth of Modernism: Art, Theater, Philosophy. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006. A reevaluation of Ibsen, in which Moi refutes the traditional definition of Ibsen as a realistic and naturalistic playwright and describes him as an early modernist.

Robinson, Michael, ed. Turning the Century: Centennial Essays on Ibsen. Norwich, England: Norvik Press, 2006. Collection of the essays published in the journal Scandinavica during the past four decades, including discussions of Ibsen’s style, his language, and the reception of his plays in England. One of the essays analyzes Rosmersholm.

Templeton, Joan. Ibsen’s Women. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997. Templeton examines the women characters in Ibsen’s plays and their relationship to the women in the playwright’s life and career. Chapter 8 includes an analysis of Rosmersholm.

Weigand, Hermann J. The Modern Ibsen: A Reconsideration. New York: Henry Holt, 1925. Reprint. Salem, N.H.: Ayer, 1984. Long a standard of Ibsen criticism, this volume covers each of the last twelve plays. The section on Rosmersholm offers a detailed and incisive explication, with emphasis on the psychological motivations of each of the characters, and serves as an excellent introduction for the general reader.