In this act, Hedda has confronted another frustration. Instead of seeing the awaited Lövborg rise to his full stature as a liberated artist victoriously imbued with life’s joy, she views a demoralized reveler who ruined the evening in a drunken orgy, facing, in addition, a possible jail sentence for assaulting a police officer.
Now that Thea has left the scene, however, she has one further chance of retaining her influence over Lövborg so that he will provide her with an act of “courage and freedom.” Offering him the pistol, Hedda imagines that he will end his life bravely and romantically to accord with her favorite images of beauty enhanced by violence and death. Furthermore, the packet of papers she possesses represents a material hold she still has on Lövborg’s destiny. By destroying the manuscript she had no share in creating or realizing, Hedda also kills the child she was unable to bear for Lövborg. By destroying that work of others which she should have accomplished herself, Hedda also destroys those constant reminders of her own inadequacies. Symbolically denying the life works of others, Hedda affirms her own unsatisfied sense of worth.
