Wild Duck Identity Crisis

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Identity Crisis: An In-depth Analysis of Hedvig Ekdal A shared goal for many individuals is to find their purpose in life. In this attempt to understand the reason why each of us has been placed here on earth, there is a secondary struggle, as Socrates said, to “know thyself.” In Ibsen’s The Wild Duck, multiple characters seek to find their true identity. However, there is one character that is quite content with having no identity at all. This character is Hedvig Ekdal, daughter of Hialmar and Gina. As a girl of fourteen who rarely leaves her house, Hedvig is satisfied staying with her parents for the rest of her life. Hedvig is a prime example of a character that lacks identity because of her sheltered lifestyle, her similarity to the wild duck, her willingness to be influenced by Gregers, and her devotion to her father. Hedvig’s lack of identity derives from her lack of knowledge from the outside world. She does not attend school because of her father’s concern for her and spends her days cooped up in a house with very little to do. Hedvig, however, enjoys her life of looking through “books with pictures in them” (144) and watching “a big clock with figures that go out and in” (145). She finds pleasure in the household pet, which happens to be a wild duck. Other than the things she has seen in picture books or learned from her parents, Hedvig knows nothing of the outside world. When a person has experienced life in a variety of aspects, they learn to make choices based on what they have experienced. One’s choices, in return, make up who they are as a person, or in other words, their identity. Hedvig is content on having her parents make all of her decisions for her. She cannot make decisions for herself and therefore has no identity. The second act of the play opens with Hedvig shading her eyes. The audience soon learns that Hedvig has a hereditary vision
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