A Doll's House and Other Plays (Penguin)

by Henrik Ibsen

ENGSTRAND: Aye, ’cos there’ll be lots of fine folk coming here tomorrow. Pastor Manders is expected from town too, you know.

  REGINE: He’s arriving today, actually.

  ENGSTRAND: There, you see! And I’m damned10 if I want him to have anything to pin on me, you understand.

  REGINE: Ah. So that’s it.

  ENGSTRAND: What do you mean, ‘that’s it’?

  REGINE [looks at him suspiciously]: What do you want to trick the pastor into this time?

  ENGSTRAND: Shh, ssh! Are you crazy? Would I want to trick Pastor Manders into anything? Oh no, Pastor Manders has always been far too nice to me for that. But what I wanted to talk to you about, see, was that I’ll be going home again tonight.

  REGINE: The sooner the better, if you ask me.

  ENGSTRAND: Aye, but I want you with me, Regine.

  REGINE [her jaw dropping]: You want me –? What did you say?

  ENGSTRAND: I said, I want you home with me.

  REGINE [scornfully]: You’ll never ever get me home with you.

  ENGSTRAND: Oh, we’ll see about that.

  REGINE: Yes, you can be sure we’ll see about it! Me! Who’s grown up here with Mrs Alving, the wife of the chamberlain? Me! Who’s been treated almost like one of the family here –? I’m supposed to move home to you? To a house like that? Ugh!

  ENGSTRAND: What the hell’s11 this? Going against your own father, are you, girl?

  REGINE [mumbles without looking at him]: You’ve said often enough that I was nothing to do with you.

  ENGSTRAND: Pah. You wouldn’t take that to heart surely –

  REGINE: Haven’t you yelled at me many times and called me a –? Fi donc!12

  ENGSTRAND: No, by God, I never used such a foul word.

  REGINE: Oh, I think I remember what word you used.

  ENGSTRAND: Aye, but that was only when I’d had a drop – hm. The temptations of this world are manifold, Regine.

  REGINE: Ugh!

  ENGSTRAND: Or when your mother decided to be difficult. I had to find something to rile her with, my child. Always acting so prim and proper. [Mimics] ‘Let me go, Engstrand! Leave me be. I’ve served three years with Chamberlain Alving’s family at Rosenvold, I have!’ [Laughs.] Jesus preserve us; she never could forget that the captain was made court chamberlain while she was in service here.

  REGINE: Poor mother – you tormented the life out of her soon enough.

  ENGSTRAND [shifting his weight]: Aye, goes without saying; I’m to blame for everything.

  REGINE [turns away, under her breath]: Ugh –! And that leg!

  ENGSTRAND: What did you say, my child?

  REGINE: Pied de mouton.13

  ENGSTRAND: English, that, is it?

  REGINE: Yes.

  ENGSTRAND: Well, well; you’ve got some learning out here right enough, and that might just come in useful now, Regine.

  REGINE [after a short pause]: So what was it you wanted with me in town?

  ENGSTRAND: Can you ask a father what he wants with his only child? Aren’t I a lonely and forsaken widower?

  REGINE: Oh, don’t give me that rubbish. Why do you want me there?

  ENGSTRAND: All right, I’ll tell you, I’ve been thinking of branching into something new.

  REGINE [huffs]: You’ve tried that often enough; it always ends in failure.

  ENGSTRAND: Aye, but this time you’ll see, Regine! – I’ll bleedin’ well14 –

  REGINE [stamping her foot]: Stop swearing!

  ENGSTRAND: Hush, hush, you’re right as ever, my child! But look, what I wanted to say was this – I’ve put a fair bit of money aside from the work on this new orphanage.

  REGINE: Have you now? Well, good for you.

  ENGSTRAND: ’Cos what’s there to spend your shillings on out here in the country?

  REGINE: Quite – and so?

  ENGSTRAND: Well, you see, I was thinking I’d put the money into something as could pay. It would be a kind of establishment for seamen –.

  REGINE: Ugh!

  ENGSTRAND: A real classy establishment, you understand – not like one of those dumps for common sailors. Hell, no – this would be for ships’ captains and officers and – and fine folk, you understand.

  REGINE: And I would –?

  ENGSTRAND: Well, you’d help out. Only for appearances’ sake, you understand. It’s not like you’d have such a God-awful15 time of it, my child. You can have things just as you want.

  REGINE: Right, I see!

  ENGSTRAND: But there’s got to be womenfolk round the house, that’s plain as day. ’Cos we’ll have a bit of fun in the evenings, of course, with singing and dancing and the like. You’ve got to remember, these are wayfaring mariners16 upon the oceans of the world. [Closer] Don’t be daft now and stand in your own way, Regine. What’s to become of you out here? What use will you have for that education the mistress has lavished on you? You’re going to take care of them kids in the new orphanage, I hear. Is that something for you, eh? Have you got such a slavering desire to go and work yourself to death for the sake of them filthy brats?

  REGINE: No, if things went the way I wanted, then –. Well, it might well happen. It might well happen!

  ENGSTRAND: What might happen?

  REGINE: Never you mind. – Is it much money you’ve put aside out here?

  ENGSTRAND: Altogether, I’d say it’ll be about seven or eight hundred kroner.17

  REGINE: That’s not bad.

  ENGSTRAND: Well, it’s enough to get started with, my child.

  REGINE: You’re not thinking of giving me any of that money?

  ENGSTRAND: No, I’m not bloody thinking of that, no.

  REGINE: You’re not thinking of sending me so much as a scrap of dress fabric even?

  ENGSTRAND: You just come into town with me, Regine, and you’ll get dress fabric aplenty.

  REGINE: Pah, if I want, I can take that in hand myself.

  ENGSTRAND: Aye, but with a father’s guiding hand it’s better, Regine. There’s a nice house I can get in Little Harbour Street. There’s not much cash needed upfront, and that could be like a kind of home for seamen, see.

  REGINE: But I don’t want to live with you! I want nothing to do with you. Now go!

  ENGSTRAND: You’d not bleedin’18 stay with me for long, child. Chance’d be a fine thing. If you knew how to handle yourself, at least. Such a pretty girl as you’ve grown into this last couple of years –

  REGINE: Oh –?

  ENGSTRAND: It wouldn’t be long before some ship’s mate came along – or a captain perhaps –

  REGINE: I don’t want to marry that sort. Sailors have no savoir vivre.19

  ENGSTRAND: What don’t they have?

  REGINE: I know about sailors, I tell you. They’re not the kind you go marrying.

  ENGSTRAND: So leave off marrying them. It can still pay. [In a more confidential tone] That man – the Englishman – the one with the yacht – he paid three hundred speciedaler,20 he did – and she weren’t no prettier than you.

  REGINE [making for him]: Get out!

  ENGSTRAND [retreating]: Steady; you wouldn’t hit me now, would you?

  REGINE: I would! Talk about mother, and I’ll hit you. Get out, I say! [Drives him up towards the garden door.] And don’t slam the doors; young Mr Alving –

  ENGSTRAND: He’s sleeping, aye. You do fuss over that young Mr Alving something awful – [Softer] Aha; it couldn’t perhaps be, that he –?

  REGINE: Out, and quick about it! You’re stark raving mad, you are. No, don’t go that way. Pastor Manders is coming. Down the kitchen stairs with you.

  ENGSTRAND [towards the right]: All right, all right, I’m going. But you just talk to him what’s coming. He’s the man will tell you what a child owes her father. ’Cos I am your father after all, see. I can prove that by the church register.21

  He goes out of the other door, which REGINE has opened, and then closes it after him.

  REGINE looks at herself hastily in the mirror, fans herself with her handkerch
ief and straightens her collar; then busies herself with the flowers.

  PASTOR MANDERS, wearing an overcoat and carrying an umbrella, and with a small travelling bag slung over his shoulder, comes into the conservatory through the garden door.

  MANDERS: Good afternoon, Miss22 Engstrand.

  REGINE [turning round, with a look of happy surprise]: Oh, Pastor Manders, good afternoon! Has the steamship arrived already?

  MANDERS: It arrived a moment ago. [Entering the garden room] What tiresome wet weather we’ve had these last few days.

  REGINE [following him]: But it’s a blessing to the farmer,23 pastor.

  MANDERS: Yes, you are right, of course. We town folk give so little thought to these things. [Starts taking his overcoat off.]

  REGINE: Oh, can I help? – There now. Goodness, look how wet it is! I’ll just hang it up in the hallway.24 And your umbrella – I’ll open it up, so it can dry.

  She goes out with the things through the second door to the right. PASTOR MANDERS takes his travel bag off and puts it on a chair together with his hat. Meanwhile REGINE comes back in.

  MANDERS: Ah, it’s certainly good to get inside. So, is all well here on the estate?

  REGINE: Yes, thank you very much.

  MANDERS: But extremely busy I imagine, preparing for tomorrow?

  REGINE: Oh, yes, there’s a fair bit to do.

  MANDERS: And Mrs Alving is at home, I hope?

  REGINE: Indeed she is, sir, she’s just upstairs seeing to the young master’s hot chocolate.25

  MANDERS: Yes, do tell me – I heard down at the quayside that Osvald had come.

  REGINE: Yes, he came the day before yesterday. We hadn’t expected him before today.

  MANDERS: And fit and well, I hope?

  REGINE: Yes, thank you, quite well. But dreadfully tired from the journey. Steamed it, he did, right from Paris – I mean, he made the whole trip on just the one train. I think he’s sleeping a little now, so we should probably talk a teensy bit quietly.

  MANDERS: Shh, we’ll be so quiet.

  REGINE [moves an armchair up to the table]: Here you are, pastor, do sit down and make yourself at home. [He sits down; she puts a footstool under his feet.] There, now! Is the pastor sitting comfortably?26

  MANDERS: Yes, thank you, I’m sitting most comfortably. [Observing her] You know something, Miss Engstrand, I honestly believe you’ve grown since I last saw you.

  REGINE: Does the pastor think so? Madam says I’ve filled out too.

  MANDERS: Filled out? Maybe, a little perhaps; well, just right.

  Short pause.

  REGINE: Shall I tell madam you’re here perhaps?

  MANDERS: Thank you, there’s no hurry, my dear child. – But tell me now, my dear Regine, how is your father doing out here?

  REGINE: Thanking you, pastor, he’s doing fairly well.

  MANDERS: He dropped by to see me last time he was in town.

  REGINE: Oh, did he? He’s always so pleased when he gets to talk to the pastor.

  MANDERS: And I take it you go down to see him quite regularly?

  REGINE: Me? Well yes, I suppose I do; whenever I get a moment –

  MANDERS: Your father’s not a very strong character, Miss Engstrand. He sorely needs a guiding hand.27

  REGINE: Yes, that may well be.

  MANDERS: He needs someone around him for whom he can feel affection and upon whose judgement he can rely. He admitted it himself so open-heartedly when he was last up to see me.

  REGINE: Yes, he did mention something of the sort to me. But I don’t know if Mrs Alving will want to lose me – especially now we have the new orphanage to run. And I’d be dreadfully reluctant to leave Mrs Alving, when she’s always been so kind to me.

  MANDERS: But a daughter’s duty, my good girl –. Of course, we’d have to get your mistress’s consent first.

  REGINE: But I’m not sure it’s right for me at my age, to keep house for a single man.

  MANDERS: What! But dear Miss Engstrand, this is your own father we’re talking about here!

  REGINE: Yes, maybe, but still –. I mean, if it was a respectable house and with a really proper gentleman –

  MANDERS: But, my dear Regine –

  REGINE: – someone I could feel a fondness for and look up to and be like a kind of daughter to –

  MANDERS: Yes, but my dear, good child –

  REGINE: ’Cos then I’d like ever so much to move to town. It’s very lonely out here – and the pastor knows himself what it means to stand alone in the world. And I think I can say I’m both able and willing. Doesn’t the pastor know of any such position for me?

  MANDERS: Me? No, I can’t honestly say I do.

  REGINE: But dear, dear pastor – do think of me at least if –

  MANDERS [getting up]: Yes, indeed, I will, Miss Engstrand.

  REGINE: Yes, because if I –

  MANDERS: Perhaps you’d be so kind as to fetch Mrs Alving?

  REGINE: She’ll be down right away, pastor.

  She goes out to the left.

  MANDERS [walks back and forth a couple of times, stands for a moment in the background with his hands behind his back, looking out into the garden. He then comes close to the table again, picks up a book and looks at the title-page, seems surprised and looks at others]: Hm – I see!

  MRS ALVING enters through the door on the left. She is followed by REGINE, who then immediately goes out through the furthest door to the right.

  MRS ALVING [holding out her hand]: Welcome, pastor.

  MANDERS: Good afternoon, Mrs Alving. Well, here I am, as I promised.

  MRS ALVING: Always on the dot.

  MANDERS: It wasn’t easy to get away, I can tell you. With all those blessed committees and boards I sit on –

  MRS ALVING: All the kinder of you, then, to arrive in such good time. Now we can get our business done before we have supper. But where’s your case?

  MANDERS [hastily]: My things are down at the village store. I’ll be staying there tonight.

  MRS ALVING [suppressing a smile]: There’s really no persuading you to stay the night under my roof this time either?

  MANDERS: No, no, Mrs Alving; thank you all the same; I’ll stay down there, as usual. It’s so convenient when I go aboard again.

  MRS ALVING: Well, you shall have it your way. Although I do really rather think that two elderly people such as ourselves –

  MANDERS: Oh, heavens above, what a way to joke. Well, naturally you’re in high spirits today. First with the celebrations tomorrow, and then with having Osvald home too.

  MRS ALVING: Yes, imagine what a joy that is for me! It’s more than two years since he was last home. And he’s promised to stay with me all winter.

  MANDERS: Oh, has he really? That’s a fine filial gesture. After all, living in Rome and Paris must offer rather different attractions, I’d imagine.

  MRS ALVING: Yes, but here at home he has his mother, you see. Oh my dear, darling boy – he certainly has room in his heart for his mother!

  MANDERS: Well, it would be all too tragic if separation and the pursuit of such a thing as art were to blunt such natural sentiments.

  MRS ALVING: Yes, you’re quite right. But there’s no risk of that with him, none at all. And now I shall enjoy seeing if you recognize him. He’ll be down soon; he’s upstairs at the moment taking a little rest on the sofa. – But do sit down now, my dear pastor.

  MANDERS: Thank you. So it’s a convenient moment –?

  MRS ALVING: Yes, of course it is.

  She sits down at the table.

  MANDERS: Good; now let me show you –. [Goes over to the chair on which his travel bag lies, takes a packet of papers out of it, sits on the opposite side of the table and looks for a clear space for the papers] Firstly, we have here –. [Breaking off] Tell me, Mrs Alving, how do these books come to be here?

  MRS ALVING: These books? They’re books I’m reading.

  MANDERS: You read this sort of literature?

  MRS ALVIN
G: Yes, I most certainly do.

  MANDERS: Do you feel you become a better or happier person with this sort of reading?

  MRS ALVING: I think I feel somehow reassured.

  MANDERS: How peculiar. In what way?

  MRS ALVING: Well, I find a sort of explanation and confirmation of a great many things I go around thinking myself. Yes, because that’s what’s so strange, Pastor Manders – there’s actually nothing new in these books at all; they only contain what most people think and believe. It’s just that most people don’t formulate it for themselves, or don’t want to admit it.

  MANDERS: Good Lord! Do you seriously believe most people –?

  MRS ALVING: Yes, I really do.

  MANDERS: Yes, but not in this country, surely? Not here amongst us?

  MRS ALVING: Oh most certainly, here amongst us too.

  MANDERS: Well, I really must say –!

  MRS ALVING: But what is it you actually object to in these books, anyway?

  MANDERS: Object to? You surely don’t think I spend my time perusing such offerings.

  MRS ALVING: In other words you have no idea what you are condemning?

  MANDERS: I’ve read quite enough about these publications to disapprove of them.

  MRS ALVING: Yes, but your own opinion –

  MANDERS: My dear lady, there are manifold instances in life when one must rely upon others. That’s the way things are in the world; and quite right too. Where would society be otherwise?

  MRS ALVING: Well, perhaps you’re right.

  MANDERS: Although I don’t deny, of course, that there can be something rather attractive about such writings. And I can’t blame you for wanting to acquaint yourself with the intellectual trends28 which are, by all reports, current out in the wider world – where you have, of course, allowed your son to roam for so long. But –

  MRS ALVING: But?

  MANDERS [lowering his voice]: But one does not talk about it, Mrs Alving. One certainly doesn’t need to give an account to all and sundry of what one reads and what one thinks inside one’s own four walls.

  MRS ALVING: No, of course not; I quite agree.

  MANDERS: Just think, now, of the responsibility you owe this orphanage, which you decided to found at a time when your opinions on spiritual and intellectual matters were entirely different from now – as far as I understand, at least.

  MRS ALVING: Yes, yes, that I admit absolutely. But it was about the orphanage –