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Ibsen Studies
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An Inquiry into the Discourses of

Solness
Jonathan Chtel
Available online: 14 Dec 2010

To cite this article: Jonathan Chtel (2010): An Inquiry into the Discourses of Solness, Ibsen Studies,
10:2, 76-91
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AN INQUIRY INTO THE DISCOURSES OF

SOLNESS

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JONATHAN CHATEL
Ibsen was very sensitive to the way people spoke. For instance, in a
famous letter to Magdalene Thoresen dated December 1865, he
makes mention of the critical distance allowed by his voluntary
exile. Angry with his native country, he claims that he can see the
the self-made lies (selvgjorde logne) or the personal phraseologies
( personlige frasemageri) which are corrupting the lives of his
contemporaries.1 There, he defines himself as an observer of those
patterns of words and language mechanisms that are commonly
used to excuse cowardice or self-indulgence.
In a sense, his literary project illustrates this point. In The Wild
Duck the conceptual life lie defended by Relling appears as the
most paradigmatic example: in a vitiated and artificial world,
everyone needs a custom-built lie to define an identity and a goal in
life and to support the strain of reality. And the truth-seekers who
want to denounce this system are also blinded by a mirage. In the
drama, Ibsen is keen on describing Gregers logomachy in parallel
with Hjalmars ridiculous self-importance. He precisely describes
the specific speech of his characters, the gimmicks, the shape of
their discourses, and points out their danger and inanity. Indeed,
Hedvig is somehow deceived by the dubious metaphor of the wild
duck and commits suicide. A discourse may have a devastating
effect on reality.
I think two tendencies always more or less coexist in Ibsens
realistic dramas, but are not equally developed. On the one hand, in
The Wild Duck, Hedda Gabler or Ghosts for instance, Ibsen seems
mainly to focus on the failure of individuals who are imprisoned in
an alienating society and a coercive value system. In an almost
sociological way, he depicts the habits, codes and discourses of the
societe bourgeoise. In plays like The Master Builder, The Lady from the
Sea or Little Eyolf, he seems to enter the more shadowy territories of
the unconscious, desire, death drive, existential despair.
q 2010 TAYLOR & FRANCIS

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An Inquiry into the Discourses of Solness

Both tendencies the sociological and the psychoanalytical are
two fields of investigation for Ibsen. There, he shows the mechanism of
different discourse practices. A discourse is not only an ideology, a
conviction or a prejudice but more generally the linguistic expression
of an intellectual structure. A discourse practice describes a way to
use discourse and, therefore, indicates the functioning of an intellectual
structure. So, the discourse practice of an individual reveals how he is
dealing with the external world as well as with his inner self. And most
of the time, those structures crumble at the end of the plays, like shaky
houses of cards.
Through the study of The Master Builder, I will take a closer look
at the second aspect of Ibsens examination of discursive practices.
I will try to foreground the process of Ibsens investigation into the
psyche of Solness. My aim is to reveal how Ibsen makes a diagnosis,
through different dramatic figures and narrative means, of the
identity crisis of the The Master Builders main character.
Body and Fear

At the beginning of the play, the Ibsenian search for theatricality is

clearly revealed in the way the characters are described. The
preliminary stage direction depicts the master builders employees
who are, in one way or another, suffering from a slight handicap.
Knut Brovik, Solnesss former teacher, is described as a thin old
man, with white hair and beard. He is dressed in a rather threadbare
but well preserved black coat (p. 357).2 Brovik, who is on the verge
of death, wants Solness to allow his son Ragnar to supervise the
construction of a villa. This is, in the beginning of the play, the main
(but rather fragile) dramatic argument. Ragnar, Broviks son, is in
his thirties, well dressed, fair-haired, with a slight stoop (p. 357) and
Kaja, Solnesss assistant, is portrayed as a slightly-built girl in her
early twenties, neatly dressed but rather delicate looking (p. 357).
When the character of Halvard Solness appears as a man of mature
years, strong and vigorous (p. 358), those details describing minor
infirmities make sense.
Indeed, just as Solness owns all the power in his house, he owns
the good health. Ibsen aims to show to what extent Halvards will
to power has ruined and almost annihilated the possibility of
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JONATHAN CHATEL

emancipation and development in his residence. When Aline enters

later on, the evidence is even more striking: . . . She looks thin and
drawn, with traces of former beauty. Fair hair in ringlets. Elegantly
dressed, all in black. She speaks rather slowly and with a plaintive
voice (p. 365). One can identify here, through the description of
this slow motion voice particularly, a characteristic symptom of
depression.3
To sum up the descriptions of the characters present
antinomies: Solness, the powerful and vigorous master, dominates
a range of sick persons. Furthermore, the closer they are to him
(like Brovik and Aline), the more they suffer from his infectious
influence. However, there are two exceptions. Two people seem to
be preserved from Solnesss poisonous presence: Doctor Herdal and
Hilde Wangel. The former, very engaging and apparently healthy,
will be used by Ibsen as a witness for the drama (like Doctor
Relling in The Wild Duck, but with a far less important role). The
latter, Hilde, is a flamboyant and playful young woman. I will have a
closer look at this character later. For the moment, it is important to
emphasize the fact that Ibsens theatre, even though it has a complex
structure, stages various types of bodies: prostrated, exhausted, sick
or, on the contrary, nervous and restless to put it in a nutshell,
disturbed and unbalanced. This is a significant aspect of Ibsens
theatricality.
As Ewbank (1994) writes, the first line immediately expresses
the intense crisis of the dramatic action as well as, to me, the body
crisis Ive just focused on. Indeed, Brovik shouts: Oh, I cant stand
this much longer! (p. 357). Those words clearly illustrate the
unbearable now (Ewbank 1994); the present dramatic time is
already at stake. And soon enough, the reader understands that the
main action of the drama may be doomed to failure. As a matter of
fact, Solnesss negative answer to Broviks request nips in the bud
what might have been the source of a conflict and, therefore, a
dramatic dynamic for the play:
BROVIK : [rises with difficulty] Have I to die like this? An unhappy man,
without any proof that I was right to have faith and confidence in
Ragnar? Without ever seeing a single example of his work? Must I do
this? . . .
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SOLNESS : [seems to battle with himself, then says in a low but firm
voice] You must die as best you can . . . [follows him, half in
desperation]. . . . I am what I am! And I cant change myself!
(p. 375)

Here again, stage lines depict bodies in an intense struggle; and this
struggle stresses the importance of the question uttered by Brovik:
what is the meaning of life when the last hour comes? So Ibsen
apparently points out that the main dramatic argument is not valid:
Ragnars project to stand on his own two feet seems to be, at this
very moment, rather impossible. However, he already implies that
his play will deal with some existential issues.
Let us go back to the body question in the play. At first glance,
Solness is the strongest one. But Ibsen soon describes here and there
the over-activity, restlessness or irascibility of Solness. He subtly
suggests that the strong/weak opposition is not so simple and that
his main character also suffers from a peculiar handicap. A dialogue
Herdal/Solness in Act 1 reveals the nature of this impairment:
SOLNESS : Night and day it terrifies me . . . terrifies me. Some day, you
see, that luck must change.
DR. HERDAL : Nonsense! What is going to change it?
SOLNESS : [ firmly and definitely ] Youth is.
(p. 375)

Solness refers to Ragnars emancipation project. And Fear is his

disease. Actually, for the whole dialogic sequence Herdal/Solness
retroactively explains the dramatic dead-end and the confined
environment depicted in the beginning of the play. Solness cant
help fearing that the usurpation of his professional situation may
backfire. That is the reason why he seduces Kaja in order to keep
Ragnar under control. He also confesses to Herdal that he took
Brovik on when he was still a young apprentice, but that he needs
him for he is so extraordinarily clever at working out stresses and
strains and cubic contents (p. 371). Moreover, he evokes the
burning of Alines house which has, in a roundabout way, offered
him the opportunity to finance his project. In sum, just as Solnesss
house is unfit for habitation (inside and outside, for the garden is
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JONATHAN CHATEL

transformed into a building site), so Solnesss existence is unstable

and ramshackle because it lacks harmonious proportions. Despite a
rather mediocre background (both socially and intellectually) he has
climbed the social ladder and now holds a high position, but he cant
really face it, for his ascent is somehow illegitimate. In other words,
his fear is the consequence of a deep-rooted guilt feeling.
In my view, Solnesss fear brings to light one last thing. In
A Philosophy of Fear, Lars Svendsen (2008) considers the nature of this
primitive human emotion. Fear is an instrument of perception. It
shows us the danger, prevents us from dying as well as improves our
ability to examine and evaluate risks. However, if fear is not properly
used it may lead to deceptive judgements and wrong interpretations:
political ones (Svendsens analyses point out the security syndrome
in our modern society) or intimate ones, like paranoia. Fear is
fundamental to the development of human intelligence. Nevertheless, it has side effects and may lead a society or a person to a
psychotic state. Svendsen quotes Epictetus to support his
demonstration: What disturbs and alarms man are not the things,
but his opinions and fancies about the things (Svendsen 2008, p. 29).
So one can fairly conclude that Solnesss fear illustrates his wrong
interpretation of things, which accounts for the delirious quality of
his discourse. Indeed, when Solness explains to Herdal that his
secret desire to seduce and attract Kaja has come true, as if by a
magical trick, Ibsen presents us with sick thinking. Solness is even
surprised that Kaja is really turned on by him: SOLNESS : . . . Ive
only got to go near her, and at once she is all shaking and trembling.
What do you make of that? . . . Her believing Id spoken to her of
things Id only wished for silently? Inwardly? To myself ? . . .
(p. 372). Accordingly, Ibsen shows a mental disorder, an alienated
discourse. Solness has a paranoid attitude and persuades himself
that everybody thinks that he is deranged: SOLNESS : . . . Aline
thinks Im mad. . . . And shes got you to believe it, too (p. 373).
Finally, Herdal considers that the main problem is the relation
between Solness and Kaja, whereas the architect is convinced that
there is something more, a strange and fearful power of attraction.
Then, the doctor is of no help because he doesnt catch Solnesss
strange speech. As a result: SOLNESS : . . . All right, my dear Doctor
. . . lets not pursue this any further Its best we agree to differ
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(p. 374). At this moment, the play becomes almost unfeasible: the
principal dramatic argument is doomed and the main character,
almost puzzled by fear, is confronted with an incapacity to
communicate with anyone and especially not with a person who is
supposed to cure him. In other words, the dialogue, and the whole
drama, may soon stop here. However, Hildes fantastic arrival will
untie this problem and reveal a new dimension to the play.
Hilde: The Return of Desire

Hildes arrival immediately follows a dialogue in which Solness

voices the fear that the young will, so to speak, dethrone him:
SOLNESS : . . . One of these days, youth is going to come here beating on
the door . . .
DR. HERDAL : [laughs] Well, good Lord, what of it?
SOLNESS : What of it? Just that it will mean the end of Master Builder
Solness. [There is a knock on the door, left. He starts.] Whats that! Did
you hear something?
DR. HERDAL : Somebodys knocking.
SOLNESS : [loudly] Come in!
[HILDE WANGEL comes in by the door from the hall. She is of medium
height, lithe, of slim build . . . ]
HILDE WANGEL: [walks across to Solness, her eyes shining and happy]
Good evening!
(p. 375)

Here, the effect of anticipation is intelligible enough to let the reader

think that the destiny of Solness is sealed. In one sense, Hilde
embodies a modern version of the tragic nemesis: she is the curse as
well as the luck (as we shall see) of the master builder. In other
words, I believe that the effect of anticipation leaves no doubt about
the ending of the play and consequently targets the reader/viewers
interest and expectation on the way all this will end, on the process
of this ending.
What I find also absolutely remarkable here is that the dramatic
language truly accompanies the delirious discourse of the architect.
Just as Solness has only wished Kajas hiring and attraction (which
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JONATHAN CHATEL

have really happened as if by magic), so Hildes entrance seems to be

triggered by his fear that some youth will knock at his door. He really
expects that one day he will be overcome and uses a metaphor
(knocking at the door) to express the pressure of the young. As if by
magic again, his wish is fulfilled (indeed, his fear might be interpreted
as a reversed desire to expiate of his guilt). Here, Ibsens dramaturgic
trick is remarkable for it gives to Solnesss speech a performative
dimension. From an intradiegetic point of view, it creates a new
character almost an allegory and likewise influences the whole
design of the play. The structure of the drama switches from a
realistic convention to a phantasmagorical one. Ibsens writing starts
to follow the logic of the architects principle of pleasure.
The play, thanks to Hildes entrance, will now dig into the
phantasmagoric impulse and injured subjectivity of Halvard. Ergo,
the dramatic dead-end, this infeasibility of the play that Ive analyzed
previously, suddenly vanishes. Solness will no longer be isolated for
he will be able to communicate with a character who has been
typically conceived by his brainsick logic. A new dynamic for the
dialogue is then produced.
One must not forget that Hilde Wangel has already appeared in a
earlier play, The Lady from the Sea. This is a decisive point. In the
latter drama, Ibsen for the first time in the realistic cycle, uses a
character who seems to have been created by Ellidas fantasy,
namely The Stranger. And the uncanny presence of this character
provides a therapeutic aspect to the play.4 In The Lady from the Sea,
Hilde is still a realistic character albeit she strangely modulates in
the background Ellidas gruesome fascination with the sea. In both
plays, she also finds it terribly exciting ( forferdelig spennende) to be
attached to men whose health or life are at stake (Lyngstrand and
Solness who are both some sort of artists). But, in The Master
Builder, the new Hilde Wangel owns the qualities of The Stranger.
She is without any doubt a phantasmagoric figure, a projection of
Solnesss fear, as The Stranger is for Ellida. Both of them can also be
characterized by their obsessive ideas: he wants Ellida to follow him,
she wants the master builder to built her a castle in the air (Luftslott).
All those converging elements lead me to believe that Hildes return
can be interpreted as a meta-dramatic comment by Ibsen, indicating
that a dramaturgic experiment is being pursued.
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An Inquiry into the Discourses of Solness

However, I see a fundamental difference between Hilde and The
Stranger: Hilde talks to Solness while the Stranger hardly speaks and
awaken mainly dread, panic, uncontrolled terror. It is just as if the
amorous game which will start between the young women and the
architect permits a more sophisticated language game: a deeper and
more precise examination of Solnesss intimacy.
In Intimate Theatres (1989), Jean-Pierre Sarrazac has developed a
dramaturgic concept which is fitting to the phantasmagoric reversal of
The Master Builder. He explains that in a part of Ibsens theatre, one can
identify that the dramatic issue is merely located in the
intrasubjectivity (intrasubjectivite) rather than the intersubjectivity
(intersubjectivite). Intersubjectivity refers to the fact that realistic
dramas traditionally stage the relations and conflicts between different
characters. On the contrary, intrasubjectivity indicates that the
drama tends to switch from this interpersonal sphere to a more
intimate one. There, the drama appears to be merely a screen on
which are shown the phantasmagoric scenarios and unconscious drive
of the character (Sarrazac 1989, p. 17). As a result, the dialogues
merely refer to the relation between the character and the hidden
part of himself (Sarrazac 1989, p. 19). This is precisely what happens
in The Master Builder: the master builder will talk with a personification
of his disproportionate fear and creeping guilt.
To me, the drama finally realizes an obvious Freudian intuition
of the return of the repressed. Hilde will definitely let in what
the defence mechanism of Solness had repressed. Her way to desire
the architect, and to be also an object of desire, will unravel the
unconscious discourse and impulses that are knocking at Solnesss
mind. In my opinion, that is the reason why Ibsen was so reluctant
when some comments claimed that he was a symbolist. Michael
Meyer quotes those famous words of Ibsen about The Master Builder:
Its extraordinary what profundities and symbols they ascribe to me.
. . . Can people just read what I write? I only write about people. I dont
write symbolically. Just about peoples inner life [my emphasis] as I know
it psychology, if you like . . . I draw real, living people. (Meyer 1985)

In the drama, Halvards tower, the three empty rooms, the vertigo,
the trolls or the castle in the air represent the archetypal structure of
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JONATHAN CHATEL

a particular human consciousness and typify the intrasubjective

dynamic of the drama. It is not the point to use symbols, Ibsen tells
us, but to let the writing draw what does exist in the psychical life of
real people. One may, therefore, talk about an ibsenian psychical
symbolism in the sense that it follows the logic of the unconscious
which is expressed through a symbolic language as Freud said.

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A Man in Search of a Soul

From Hildes entrance, the dramatic time and action will stretch in
retrospective sequences where Solness will tell his strange story.
The different dialogues Hilde/Solness will then go further into the
builders memory and guilt feeling and at the same time build the
foundation of a renewed ideal Self , as a response to the initial
identity crisis.
Let us focus on the first aspect of this dynamic, that is to say the
digging out of the intimate perception of time. A line reveals
the recollections process: SOLNESS : . . . The more I think about
it, the more I seem to have been tormenting myself for years . . .
hm! . . . Trying to identify . . . some experience I felt I must have
forgotten. But I never discovered what it could have been
(pp. 388 389). Solness is, as his new friend tells him, a forgetful
person. Hildes return of the repressed will then slowly replace the
amnesia with a remembering which was previously suppressed.
To borrow the psycho-analytic vocabulary, the first dialogue
Hilde/Solness will compose a primal scene. As we know it, Solness
finally admits what happened in Lysanger: the climbing to the top of
the church tower, the singing and last but not least the kisses and the
promise to Hilde that he will come back in ten years to built her a
kingdom. Besides the dream-like physiognomy of this scene, I regard
Solnesss acceptance of this remebering as an existential bet. In a
way, Halvard bets on Hildes affirmation because it conveys both
culpability and an idealization of his Self. Culpability, because Hilde
describes a sexual attempt on a child, or a young teenager. I am
aware that the conception of sexuality has changed in the course of
over one century. However, Solnesss guilt is clearly palpable. That is
why the master builder is so disinclined to admit it: the repressed
defence must slowly break apart. However, the counterpart of it is
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An Inquiry into the Discourses of Solness

Hildes fanatical idealization of the architect. She desires him and
sees him as the fully potent and vigorous man that he no longer is.
Therefore, if Solness acknowledges his guilt, at least his shameful
inclination, he on the other hand makes up an Idealized Self. This is
the first step and hope for a reconfiguration of his identity.
Here, I see also to what extent Ibsens psychical symbolism is
accurate. As a matter of fact, Hilde was 13 years old when Solness
kissed her. In the present dramatic action Alines house burning goes
back 12 or 13 years, as is said in the Herdal/Solness dialogue. The
reader can, therefore, associate Hilde and this burning. With this
character Ibsen mixes past and present temporalities. And everything
leads us to believe that Solness is directly dealing with what gnaws at
him, his immense debt and supposed responsibility in the burning.
So, the master builder bets on Hildes remembering, and this will
afford an authentic trauma to be analyzed. Psychoanalysis teaches
that in order to rebuild oneself, it is essential to overcome the
forgetting, rebuild the temporal experience and identify the cause of
the inner pain. The primal scene of Lysanger may be apocryphal,
but it opens up a narrative process which is the first step to recovery.
The drama then goes deeper in a psychical progression. As we
know it, the second and third acts penetrate the demented view that
Solness has of the burning and his childrens death. If anyone can be
held responsible for this tragic event, but in an indirect way, it is Aline.
Solness tells Hilde that his wife has fed her children with a sick milk
after the night of the burning. In spite of that, the architect still feels
guilty simply because he desired the fire. Hilde keeps saying that he is
innocent, but a doubt still remains: HILDE : Well, even so, you arent
in any way to blame. SOLNESS [fixes his eyes on her and nods slowly]
Ah, that is precisely the great and terrible question. That is the doubt
that nags me, day and night (p. 407). What I find interesting here is
that Solness no longer doubts what really happened that night or in
Lysanger, but now intensely doubts that he is faultless.
Ibsen will next display another aspect of Solnesss discourse,
namely his delirious interpretation of his responsibility. It is just as if
the anamnesis process has touched the core of Solnesss fear and
trouble in Act 1 and then activated the most eccentric thinking.
Halvard fully develops what he was only suggesting with Herdal: he
believes, like a child, that he owns supernatural power, embodied by
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servants, trolls or demons, which destroy human life without mercy

in order to obey their masters most hidden desires:
SOLNESS : Who called on the helpers and servant? I did! And they came
and did my bidding. [In rising excitement.] Thats what people call
being lucky. But let me tell you what that sort of luck feels like! It feels
as if my breast were a great expanse of raw flesh. And these helpers and
servants go flaying off skin from other peoples bodies to patch my
wound. Yet the wound never heals . . . never!
(p. 412)

What I would call a psychotic lyricism is striking here. Ibsens inquiry

into an unsteady identity now leads the dramatic language to follow a
poetic of the unconscious. Mytho-poetical references pour in to give
eloquence to Solnesss elegy. Moreover, as Freud analyzes it in Totem
and Taboo (1999), I think that Solnesss discourse depicts the
syndrome of omnipotence of thought or magic thought that is
characteristic of the primitive consciousness and can be defined as a
projection of inner mental life onto the external world. In short, the
suppressed ambivalence of the desire for the death of the beloved
ones (Solnesss children), that is to say the taboo, is externalized onto
demonic creatures.5 This is exactly the movement of Solnesss mind.
So, the exploration of the intimate perception of time is ruined by
the immoderate thoughts of the character. Solnesss delirium
deconstructs what the recollection process had started: a chain of
causal events which proved his innocence. The drama enters more
deeply into the search of Solnesss soul, to quote C.G. Jungs book. It
unfolds the different levels of Solnesss psyche, from uncertain
remembering to the kernel of his deranged imagination.
Solnesss bet on the primal scene of Lysanger was carrying the
hope of a reconfiguration of his identity. Paradoxically, the anamnesis
leads to more phantasmagoric episodes and an intensified existential
doubt. In Act 3, the architect becomes aware of his aporetic identity:
SOLNESS : . . . And now, looking back, what does it all add up to? In fact,
Ive built nothing. Nor did I really sacrifice anything for the chance to
build. Nothing! Absolutely nothing!
(pp. 439 440)
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An Inquiry into the Discourses of Solness

To understand this disillusioned view on his whole lifes balance,
I must now highlight another aspect of Ibsens inquiry into Solnesss
psyche.

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The Use of Utopia

The drilling into a temporal experience and a family disaster, the

exploration of a psychotic disorder, are accompanied by a more
philosophical aspect in the play: an examination of the structuring
principles of Solnesss subjectivity. In one sense, the grieving process
over the children is also a grieving over the architects Self.
Hilde, as I said previously, has an idealized view of the architect.
This Ideal Self will in a way be an element of comparison for Solness
when he looks back at his unstable existential positioning. Worthy
of notice is also Ibsens use of a spatial metaphor: the ramshackle
identity of his character can be interpreted through his building
choices. His aporetic situation in the end of the play is a double
architectural failure, a refusal of both the divine transcendence
(church) and the human reality (house). Initially Solness was a
church builder and he even understood the child loss as an ordeal
and a necessary divine sacrifice. But he soon renounced God. So, the
primal scene of Lysanger is not only the beginning of Solnesss
guilt towards Hilde, but also towards the Almighty:
SOLNESS : Then just as He had I did the impossible.
HILDE : The impossible?
SOLNESS : Never before had I been able to stand heights. But that day I
could. . . . And as I stood there on high, at the very top, and as I hung
the wreath on the weathercock, I spoke to Him: Listen to me,
Almighty One! From this day forward, I too will be free. A master
builder free in his own field, as you are in yours. Never again will I build
churches for you. Only homes for the people.
(p. 439)

The vertigo of Solness is obviously polysemic. It is not only a

physical one or the one of his identity; it is a more ontological one:
the impossibility as an individual of facing God. The meaning of
guilt, as I just implied, is then also polysemic. In the last sense, it
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JONATHAN CHATEL

refers to the human affirmation of Liberty in almost a kierkegaardian

gesture, under the fear and trembling of transcendence. But
Solnesss defiance was useless because the human and real world is
disappointing. Act 1 is a clear illustration of that. According to
Solness, human happiness doesnt exist for people who only look for
a place to live and not to be: SOLNESS : Because now I see that people
have no use for these homes of theirs . . . (p. 439). One can see how
ambivalent Solnesss discourse is: on the one hand he blames himself
for destroying human happiness, on the other he claims that humans
dont know how to live properly. The guilt is then tainted with hatred
towards both God and Humanity. Solness is a hybrid creature, semihuman, semi-God. He profanes Heaven and devastates humans.
Ibsen once said that his plays started as philosophical essays. In
The Master Builder, through a very concrete and poignant dramatic
story, he points to an existential controversy: how can the Self
be autonomous and free from Transcendence or Reality? Both
conceptual entities which either exceed any singular determination
or, on the contrary, compel and prevent the affirmation of the Self.
A last element must be considered. At the end of the play, Solness
will indeed climb to the top of an impossible monument, a
utopia, which is built in the garden during the play. This house is
positively deformed and monstrous: in Act 1 Solness says that it is a
villa with a disproportionate tower and, in Act 3, it is clearly
associated with Hildes castle in the air. By the way, a castle in the
air is a synonym for a castle in Spain; and Ibsen indicates it when
Hildes character says that the kingdom of Orangia (the first
Utopia of Hilde and Solness) may be in Spain. In a word, to
overcome his aporetic situation, Solness climbs to the top of an
Ideal, with no care for the feasibility of this intellectual and physical
performance, with no care for mortal danger.
Thanks to a subtle metaphoric process, Ibsen pursues an
interrogation, which is continuous in all his plays, on the relation
between the individual and the Ideal, whether it is a social utopia or
a narcissist idealisation of oneself. He signifies, without any doubt,
that Solness is climbing to the top of a Utopia of himself that he has
created and developed with Hilde. Quite strikingly, that impossible
monument is out of sight. Ibsen never indicates in the stage
directions that this monstrous house appears before the public.
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An Inquiry into the Discourses of Solness

It is only the fictional characters who convey this vision. The house
is out of frame or off screen. This can bring to light the relation
one has with utopia: it is something we look for, even work hard for,
without seeing it.
In A Dolls House, the unstable definition of the miraculous
(Rekdal 2002), in Ghosts the loose meaning of Joy of life, in
Rosmersholm the dubious Aristocracy or the improbable and deadly
Dionysiac dream (Helland 1994) in Hedda Gabler (to quote only
those dramas), are for me the different faces of the Ibsenian inquiry
into the moral ideologies/utopias of individuals who are desperately
trying to escape the confined and coercive value system of the
modern societe bourgeoise. Even though The Master Builder merely
appears as an exploration of the unconscious, I think Ibsen is also
pondering that problem. Actually, an observation of the intimate
perception of time or a psychotic disorder is not incompatible with a
reflection on utopia and moral ideology. After all, the inner life of
the real, living people is composed of traumas and fancies, but also
Ideals.
Hildes last mission will then be to destroy the pernicious moral
value of the Christian culture. During the drama, even the sound of
duty ( plikt) is unbearable to her. She also diagnoses Solnesss fear
and existential dead-end as a consequence of his weak and sick
consciousness. To cast out this lethal moral system, she leads her
master builder to imagine an Ideal which is a caricature of the
nietzschean Ubermensch:
HILDE : [as though breaking off her thoughts] But you were saying
about these vikings, master builder . . . ?
SOLNESS : Ah, yes. Those fellows now they had robust consciences all
right. They hadnt lost any of their appetite when they got home.
Happy as children they were, too.
(p. 414)

As the monument is crazy so this Ideal is. Ibsens irony there is

obvious. The fall of Solness may be read as a defeat, a fatal
retribution, as the builder actually expected it in Act 1. The hybris
there is Solnesss delusions of grandeur; something that Ibsen was
already denouncing in his notes for Ghosts.6
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JONATHAN CHATEL

Is this fall the price to pay to perform an authentic free act and
realize human liberty or is it barely the consequence of a Self
fanaticism and megalomania? As I see it, the ambiguity is
unsolvable. And it is not the important thing to understand here.
Ibsens interest is not in judging his character but in showing,
through his story, a language process. He stages different levels of
discourses which compose the human psyche: the perception of
time, the representation of guilt, the psychotic delirium, the
construction of moral Ideals which permit the building up and
reconfiguration of a last illusion of Solnesss Self.
Incidentally, Solness is above all (in spite of his symbolic name)
a common man rather than a tragic hero. His struggle is chiefly
against himself, against his neurosis and guilt-feeling which prevent
him from accepting that he is a real architect. A man who is getting
old and whose desire and will to overcome are stimulated by a
young woman. The utopia is also maybe this emerging love that is
creating poetic and surreal dialogues. Ibsen leads his character, on
the brink of death, to transform the real grief and sorrow into a
dream-like game with singing girls and a castle in the air.
Does Solness really fail? Does Ibsen, as Binswanger wrote, let his
character fall in order to reassure himself at the peak of existence?
Is Hilde a demonic creature? One can ask such questions but must
also listen to Ibsens comments on the master builders ascent: But
was it so mad if it cost him his life, if he did it for his own happiness
and only then, for the first time, achieved it? (Meyer 1985, p. 727).

Notes
1 This letter is quoted in Kittang (2006). Atle Kittang deliberates, among other
things, on the ambivalence of Ibsen exile; its nostalgic as well as contrapuntal
aspect.
2 All quotes are from The Master Builder in McFarlane (1966).
3 See Kristeva (1987), especially Chapter 2, Vie et mort de la parole, where
Kristeva analyzes the effect of depression on the speech.
4 See Henriksen (1984), or Rekdal (2005).
5 See Freud (1999) Chapter 2 Taboo and Emotional Ambivalence and Chapter 3
Animism, Magic and the Omnipotence of the Thought. In Chapter 3, 3,
Freud describes the case of a neurotic patient which is strikingly similar to
Solness: . . . his sense of guilt has a justification: it is founded on the intense and
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An Inquiry into the Discourses of Solness

frequent death-wishes against his fellows which are unconsciously at work in
him. . . . This behaviour, as well as the superstitions which he practises in
ordinary life, reveals his resemblance to the savages who believe they can alter
the external world by mere thinking.
6 For this point see Magris (2003).

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References
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McFarlane, James W. (ed.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, pp. 126154.
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International Library of Psychology.
Helland, Frode (1994): Irony and Experience in Hedda Gabler, in Contemporary
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Kristeva, Julia (1987): Soleil Noir/Black Sun. Paris, France: Gallimard/Folio-essais.
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Gabler. The Master Builder, Arup, J. and McFarlane, J.W. (trans.). London: Oxford
University Press, pp. 353 445.
Meyer, Michael (1985): Henrik Ibsen. Harmondsworth: Penguin Literary Biographies.
Rekdal, Anne-Marie (2002): The female jouissance, an analysis of Ibsens Et
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JONATHAN CHATEL received his PhD in Theatrical Studies on Ibsens realistic dramas
from the Sorbonne University in 2009. He has taught at Sorbonne University and at
ESAT, a scenographer school. He has written a series of articles on Ibsen and
contemporary theatre. E-mail: jonathan_chatel@yahoo.fr

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