Mr. Archer
was happily inspired when he spoke of "the pure melody" of the piece,
and the best scenes of _The Master-Builder_ were heroically and almost
recklessly poetical.
This remarkable composition is full of what, for want of a better word,
we must call "symbolism." In the conversations between Solness and Hilda
much is introduced which is really almost unintelligible unless we take
it to be autobiographical. The Master-Builder is one who constructs, not
houses, but poems and plays. It is the poet himself who gives
expression, in the pathetic and erratic confessions of Solness, to his
doubts, his craven timidities, his selfish secrets, and his terror at
the uniformity of his "luck." It is less easy to see exactly what Ibsen
believed himself to be presenting to us in the enigmatical figure of
Hilda, so attractive and genial, so exquisitely refreshing, and yet
radically so cruel and superficial. She is perhaps conceived as a symbol
of Youth, arriving too late within the circle which Age has trodden for
its steps to walk in, and luring it too rashly, by the mirage of
happiness, into paths no longer within its physical and moral capacity.
Pages:
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222