The established view of Hedda Gabler sees the play as a study of the frustration and despair engendered in the exceptional individual by a conventionalised society. In this paper I present a psychoanalytic re-interpretation of the play which in certain respects inverts this received reading. Insofar as it does so, however, my interpretation is intended not to cancel the received view but to play against it. The first section of the paper is predominantly Freudian …showed first 75 words of 11254 total…

…showed last 75 words of 11254 total…aking her own idiomatic gesture. To destroy everything is to leave nothing left to want, nothing left to envy. If nothing is left to be reduced to nothing, something may begin to be. 'A terrible beauty is born', and a destiny is fatefully fulfilled. EPILOGUE - STAGING THE PLAY Finally I shall claim that the two best known and most distinguished productions of Hedda Gabler in recent years lend support to t