olidly put together. The structure of
'Ghosts' recalls Voltaire's criticism of one of Moliere's plays that it
seemed to be in action, altho it was almost altogether in narrative.
Ibsen has here shown a skill like Moliere's in making narrative vitally
dramatic. Ibsen has none of Moliere's breadth of humor, none of his
large laughter, none of his robust fun; indeed, Ibsen's humor is rarely
genial; grim and almost grotesque, it is scarcely ever playful; and
there is sadly little laughter released by his satiric portrayals of
character. But the Scandinavian playwright has not a little of the great
Frenchman's feeling for reality, and even more of his detestation of
affectation and his hatred of sham. The creator of _Tartuffe_ would have
appreciated _Pastor Manders_, an incomparable prig, with self-esteem
seven times heated, engrossed with appearances only and ingrained with
parochial hypocrisy.

But we may be assured that Moliere, governed by the social instinct as
he was, would never have shared Ibsen's sympathy for the combatant hero
of his next play, that 'Enemy of the People,' with the chief figure of
which the dramatist has seemed willing for once to be identified. We may
even incline to the belief that Moliere would have dismist _Dr.
Stockman_ as lacking in common-sense, and in the sense of humor, and
also as a creature both conceited and self-righteous, pitiably
impractical and painfully intolerant. And we are quite at a loss even to
guess what the French playwright-psychologist, who has left us the
unforgetable figure of _Celimene_ would have thought of _Hedda Gabler_,
that strangest creation of the end of the century, anatomically
virtuous, but empty of heart and avid of sensation.

In 'Hedda Gabler' as in the 'Enemy of the People' Ibsen gives up the
Sophoclean form which was exactly appropriate for the theme of 'Ghosts.'
With admirable artistic instinct the playwright returns to the framework
of the "well-made play" or at least to that modification of the Scribe
formula which Augier and Dumas _fils_ had devised for their own use. The
action has not happened before the curtain rises on the first act; it
takes place in the play itself, in front of the spectators, just as it
does in the 'Demi-monde.' The exposition is contained in the first act,
clearly and completely; the characters are all set in motion before us,
_Hedda_ and her husband, _Mrs. Elvsted_ and _Eilert_, and the sinister
figure of _Inspector Brack_ in