Henrik Ibsen: Trending quotes

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Henrik Ibsen: 138 quotes9 likes

“Forget that foreign word "ideals." We have that good old native word: "lies."”

Henrik Ibsen The Wild Duck

Relling, Act V
The Wild Duck (1884)

“Nora. Look here, Doctor Rank - you know you want to live.”

A Doll's House (1879)

“When we dead awaken. … We see that we have never lived.”

Henrik Ibsen When We Dead Awaken

Irene, in Act II
When We Dead Awaken (1899)

“I have already told you that what I want to speak about is the great discovery I have made lately - the discovery that all the sources of our moral life are poisoned and that the whole fabric of our civic community is founded on the pestiferous soil of falsehood.”

Henrik Ibsen An Enemy of the People

Dr. Stockmann, Act IV
An Enemy of the People (1882)

“Rank. Certainly. However wretched I may feel, I want to prolong the agony as long as possible.”

Act I
A Doll's House (1879)

“Mrs. Elvsted: You have some hidden motive in this, Hedda!
Hedda: Yes, I have. I want for once in my life to have power to mold a human destiny.
Mrs. Elvsted: Have you not the power?
Hedda: I have not—and never had it.
Mrs. Elvsted: Not your husband's?
Hedda: Do you think it's worth the trouble? Oh, if only you could understand how poor I am. And fate has made you so rich!”

Act II
Hedda Gabler (1890)

“You don't get nothing for nothing in this life.”

Dr. Rank, Act III
A Doll's House (1879)

“To crave for happiness in this world is simply to be possessed by a spirit of revolt. What right have we to happiness?”

Manders, Act I
Ghosts (1881)

“Brand: Answer me, God, in the jaws of death:
Is there no salvation for the Will of Man?
No small measure of salvation?
[The avalanche buries him. The valley is swallowed up. ]
A Voice: [Calls through the crashing thunder] He is the God of Love.”

Act V
Brand (1866)

“What's to become of the morally sound? Left out in the cold, I suppose. We must heal the sick.”

Dr. Rank, Act I
A Doll's House (1879)

“If you take the life lie from an average man, you take away his happiness as well.”

Henrik Ibsen The Wild Duck

Relling, Act V
The Wild Duck (1884)

“A marriage based on full confidence, based on complete and unqualified frankness on both sides; they are not keeping anything back; there's no deception underneath it all. If I might so put it, it's an agreement for the mutual forgiveness of sin.”

Henrik Ibsen The Wild Duck

Hjalmar, Act IV
The Wild Duck (1884)

“There are three Empires. First there is the Empire which was founded on the tree of knowledge. Then there is the Empire founded on the tree of the Cross. The third is still a secret Empire which will be founded on the tree of knowledge and the tree of the Cross — brought together.”

Henrik Ibsen Emperor and Galilean

Emperor and Galilean (1873), as quoted by Lester B. Pearson in his address on accepting the Nobel Peace Peace Prize in Oslo, Norway (10 December 1957) http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1957/pearson-acceptance.html

“There can be no freedom or beauty about a home life that depends on borrowing and debt.”

Torvald Helmer, Act I
A Doll's House (1879)

“It is inexcusable for scientists to torture animals; let them make their experiments on journalists and politicians.”

As quoted in The Book of Poisonous Quotes (1993) edited by Colin Jarman, p. 232.

“I hold that man is in the right who is most closely in league with the future.”

Letter to Georg Brandes (3 January 1882).

“The common people are nothing more than the raw material of which a People is made.”

Henrik Ibsen An Enemy of the People

Dr. Stockmann, Act IV
An Enemy of the People (1882)

“Really to sin you have to be serious about it.”

Button-Moulder, Act V, Scene VII
Peer Gynt (1867)

“The black, cold, icy water. Down and down, without end — if it would only end.”

Nora Helmer, Act III
A Doll's House (1879)

“I've the most extraordinary longing to say 'Bloody Hell!”

Nora Helmer, Act I
A Doll's House (1879)