The Struggle for Existence. Ibsen’s The Wild Duck (Vildanden, 1884)

Abstract

Moreover, the symbolism of the wild duck is clearly influenced by Darwin, either by Darwin’s reports in Variations of Animals and Plants under Domestication (1868) about how wild ducks degenerate in captivity (Bull 1932, 23–24; Downs 1950, 148–149; Zwart 2000, 94–95), or, more probably, by the chapter on domestication and variation in On the Origin of the Species (1859), which was translated into Danish in 1872 (Aarseth 1999, 127–128, 2005, 6; Rem 2014, 163). In the literature it is underscored that in this play Ibsen foregrounds domestication as degeneration, whereas Darwin’s main point is that it leads to variation in the species (Tjønneland 1998; Zwart 2000; Aarseth 2005; Shepherd-Barr 2015; Rem 2014). What I will argue is (1) that Ibsen, or the play as a whole, does not equate domestication with degeneration, (2) that the key to the play is the total constellation of animals and birds in the loft, not just the duck, and (3) that the loft is a scenic metaphor for the struggle for existence fought within and between the two families. In this way the image of the loft, an image in which the characters in the drama are reflected,