Ghosts

“Well, I seem to find explanation and confirmation of all sorts of things I myself have been thinking. For that is the wonderful part of it, Pastor Manders—there is really nothing new in these books, nothing but what most people think and believe. Only most people either don't formulate it to themselves, or else keep quiet about it.”

Helen defends the secular books she reads to Pastor Manders. While the pastor criticizes the books as immoral, Helen has found self-assurance by reading the work of others who feel disconnected from religious strictures. These books signal Helen’s growing dissatisfaction with social conventions and her burgeoning desire to break free.

“People would be only too ready to interpret our action as a sign that neither you nor I had the right faith in a Higher Providence.”

Pastor Manders details to Helen the reasons why they should not insure the orphanage—primarily because he is afraid of what others will think of him. Manders decides not to insure the orphanage, a decision that he regrets after the orphanage burns down. Through Manders, Ibsen highlights the hypocrisy of religious figures who tout Christian principles of humility while maintaining an undeterred sense of self-absorption.

“Yes, it's really the Prodigal Son, sir.”

In a biblical allusion, Oswald refers to himself as the prodigal son while greeting Pastor Manders. The Parable of the Prodigal Son tells the story of a father’s unconditional love for his wayward son. Oswald places himself in the position of the wayward son and his mother in the position of the accepting father. Ibsen’s interpretation of the parable questions the limits of a parent’s love.

“I have no doubt there are many who can keep their inner self unharmed in that profession, as in any other.”

Pastor Manders tempers his previous criticism of Oswald’s choice to become an artist while still communicating his belief in the destructive nature of life secularly. The “inner self” refers to one’s spiritual well-being. Ibsen employs irony here: Oswald does not suffer from harm to his soul, but his body is ravaged by syphilis because of his choices. Manders’s judgment of Oswald’s artistic lifestyle reflects the conventional view of artists as rebellious and dangerous.

“I sometimes wonder whether it wasn't too early.”

Oswald ponders whether he was too young and inexperienced to live on his own. He hints at his regret over his choices, which have yielded irrevocable results—syphilis that has now progressed to the tertiary stage. He blames himself for his suffering from syphilis, though it is also possible that he inherited the disease from his father.

“I have never noticed anything particularly irregular about the life these people lead.”

In response to Pastor Manders’s commentary on the “irregular marriages” (23) of artists, Oswald responds that he does not view the loving and devoted relationships between unmarried people and their children to be irregular. Oswald serves as a foil to Manders, who maintains a steadfast dedication to social and religious convention, rather than embodying the spirit of forgiveness and acceptance Ibsen hints should be the real message of Christianity.

“It is the very mark of the spirit of rebellion to crave for happiness in this life. What right have we human beings to happiness? We have simply to do our duty, Mrs. Alving!”

The pastor chastises Helen for desiring happiness. As an authority figure embodying tradition and religion, Manders represents the oppressive forces that haunt Helen. Later in the play, Helen chooses to rebel against these external pressures to build an honest relationship with her son.

“You have been all your life under the dominion of a pestilent spirit of self-will. The whole bias of your mind has been toward insubordination and lawlessness. You have never known how to endure any bond. Everything that has weighed upon you in life you have cast away without care or conscience, like a burden you were free to throw off at will.”

As Manders and Helen recall the past, he scolds Helen for her inability to fully live up the impossible and repressive ideals imposed on women by organized religion. He describes Helen’s unhappiness as “a pestilent spirit” that corrupts her. Throughout the play, Ibsen exposes the hypocrisy of Manders, who repeatedly contradicts his teachings in self-preservation. Manders’s criticism of Helen and Regina reveals the misogynistic double standard that blames women for not wanting to endure abuse and sacrifice their own desires.

“Ghosts! The couple from the conservatory—risen again!” 

After hearing Oswald and Regina in the kitchen, Helen refers to them as ghosts who remind her of her late husband and the maid who engaged in a sexual affair that resulted in Regina’s birth. As the title of the play, “ghosts” represent the past that has led Helen to live a life of repression and restriction. Throughout the play, she confronts the ghosts of the past and seeks to live a life of freedom.

“Oh, that perpetual law and order! I often think that is what does all the mischief in this world of ours.”

In response to the pastor’s praise of law and order, Helen comments on the danger that repressive dogma creates rebellion. Ibsen’s use of the word “perpetual” emphasizes the passing of social expectations from generation to generation. As Helen rejects her upbringing and forges a new life for herself, she openly criticizes the social conventions that have restricted her in the past.

“Well, I can't help it; I must have done with all this constraint and insincerity. I can endure it no longer. I must work my way out to freedom.”

No longer devoted to a social script, Helen resolves to free herself by revealing the truth to Oswald about his father’s infidelity. Helen uses the words “constraint” and “insincerity” to describe the appearance-saving concerns of society. She declares that she will no longer follow this path of blinkered obedience.

“But I almost think we are all of us ghosts, Pastor Manders. It is not only what we have inherited from our father and mother that ‘walks’ in us. It is all sorts of dead ideas, and lifeless old beliefs, and so forth. They have no vitality, but they cling to us all the same, and we cannot shake them off. Whenever I take up a newspaper, I seem to see ghosts gliding between the lines. There must be ghosts all the country over, as thick as the sands of the sea. And then we are, one and all, so pitifully afraid of the light.”

Helen refers to the title of the play once again, describing the beliefs she has inherited from previous generations as “ghosts.” This metaphor highlights the outdated, ghoulish, and horrific nature of the oppressive beliefs that have damaged her psyche and life; they literally haunt the next generation. Throughout the play, Helen strives to confront and escape these ghosts.

“You are now over head and ears in Boards and Committees, and I am fighting my battle with ghosts, both within me and without.”

Realizing that Pastor Manders has not changed, Helen resigns to no longer speak of the past with him. She characterizes Manders’s adherence to his public reputation and power by describing him as consumed by “Boards and Committees.” While she fights an existential “battle with ghosts,” he strives for image control via self-serving tactics. No longer connected by the same belief system, Pastor Manders and Helen no longer have an emotional or intellectual connection.

“A man's conscience isn't always as clean as it might be.”

Jacob confesses to Pastor Manders that he is not Regina’s father and that he lied to the pastor. By speaking in general terms and referring to “a man’s conscience” rather than specifically to himself, Jacob alludes to the other men in the play who grapple with the consequences of bad decisions and misbehavior. This foreshadows Manders’s own guilty conscience over the fire at the orphanage.

“He said, ‘The sins of the fathers are visited upon the children.’”

Oswald recounts to his mother his diagnosis of syphilis, which his French doctor described as possibly inherited—a less likely scenario, but one that doctors sometimes proposed to spare a patient having to own up to sexual indiscretion. The doctor’s statement alludes to a biblical verse on God’s punishment for man’s sins passed on to subsequent generations. This verse describes the inheritance Oswald receives from his father, which is the center of Ibsen’s plot.

“But in the great world people won't hear of such things. There, nobody really believes such doctrines any longer. There, you feel it a positive bliss and ecstasy merely to draw the breath of life.”

Oswald praises the secular world outside his hometown—there, people can live a life of “bliss” and “ecstasy,” free from social conventions. This desire for life outside of external expectations drives Helen to confront the past and Oswald to seek freedom from his affliction in death.

“Terrible! Mrs. Alving, it is a judgment upon this abode of lawlessness.”

Manders refers to the fire at the orphanage as evidence of God’s judgment on the immorality of the Alving family. Ibsen offers a different interpretation of the fire: It severs any of Helen’s ties to the past and allows her to break free from the need to honor her unfaithful husband’s memory completely. In the aftermath of the fire, she abandons her plans for the orphanage and reveals the full truth to Oswald.

“Everything will burn. All that recalls father's memory is doomed. Here am I, too, burning down.”

Oswald predicts that anything related to his father will burn down in the future. He references his father’s memory as “doomed” and foreshadows his own demise as his father’s son. Here, Ibsen highlights the tragic ending of the play, which leads to Oswald’s destruction.

“A little while ago you spoke of the joy of life; and at that word a new light burst for me over my life and everything connected with it.”

Helen decides to tell Oswald the truth about his father. Oswald’s words about finding joy in freedom have inspired her to unveil the truth. No longer beholden to her duty as a wife, Helen chooses to confront her demons and expose Oswald to the truth about his father’s past.

“A poor girl must make the best of her young days, or she'll be left out in the cold before she knows where she is. And I, too, have the joy of life in me, Mrs. Alving!”

Regina announces her refusal to care for the sick Oswald; she compares herself to Captain Alving and Oswald. A foil to Helen, Regina does not follow the expectation that women nurture the men around them. Instead, she chooses a new life for herself. As a representation of the next generation of women, Regina rebels against the social conventions that seek to restrict her.

“When a son has nothing to thank his father for? has never known him? Do you really cling to that old superstition?—you who are so enlightened in other ways?”

Oswald questions why he should love his father no matter what in a series of rhetorical questions that spur Helen’s continued growth. Throughout the play, Oswald serves as a catalyst for Helen to examine her traditional upbringing and assumptions.

“And meantime the sun will be rising. And then you will know all. And then I shall not feel this dread any longer.”

Oswald asks Helen to help him die by suicide. He mentions the impending sunrise as a symbol of the truth that will be uncovered through this candid conversation. The sun in the final moments of the play signals a new beginning for Oswald and Helen in their relationship as mother and son, but leaves Helen with the terrible choice of assisting Oswald to die with dignity like he wishes.

“I never asked you for life. And what sort of a life have you given me? I will not have it! You shall take it back again!”

Oswald argues with Helen over her hesitancy to help him die with dignity, sparing him from suffering. He blames Helen for his life and demands she right her wrongs. Oswald’s request prompts Helen’s consideration of the ultimate moral quandary.