INVESTIGATING GREED IN IBSEN’S HEDDA GABLER: A MARXIST STUDY

Abstract

This study conducts a Marxist critique of Henrik Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler (1891), positing the play as a prescient analysis of the socio-psychological consequences of capitalist expansion. Moving beyond conventional psychological readings, the argument centers on greed not as an individual flaw but as a systemic byproduct of class dynamics. The analysis traces how bourgeois accumulation and the alienation of the proletariat during industrialization establish a template for exploitation that is subsequently internalized by the ascendant working class. Through the characters of Hedda Gabler, Jørgen Tesman, and Ejlert Løvborg, the drama delineates a cyclical transfer of avarice: the bourgeoisie, in its decline, exhibits moral decay, while the educated proletariat, upon gaining agency, replicates the very oppressive behaviors it once endured. This mirroring results in the corrosion of familial structures, emotional bonds, and individual sanity. The paper concludes that Ibsen’s work anticipates the enduring pathology of late capitalism—a condition defined by pervasive alienation and the destruction of communal integrity in the pursuit of material and social capital. Thus, Hedda Gabler is reframed as a critical lens through which to examine the persistent crises of modernity.