cultural resources in henrik ibsen's early environment - Ibsen.net

director, who was a bachelor by necessity and a woman-hater on principle, watched over
his protégé with Argus-eyed jealousy, so that he should not fall into the hands of any of
the "accursed defective creatures," his pet-name for the ladies! Now it had just occurred,
that the watched-over young man had displayed, in a little-too-obvious a fashion, his
interest in the company's youngest and prettiest female artist: a girl scarcely eighteen
years old, who was present and enjoyed herself rather well during the critique. As for the
matter in question, it was one of the rather frequent skirmishes between the director and
his favorite, and the former's cynical scorn had as usual caused the latter to go berserk,
and throw whatever he wanted at him, whereupon he had taken flight.
"Think, how unlucky, that he (i.e., the writer) did not get hit in the neck by the
carafe!" burst out one of the ladies.
"But then I should have been doomed," I interjected.
"Yes, surely a lucky break!" it sounded in a chorus, continuing in the jargon.
"But where is the wild berserker now?" I asked.
"Naturally, with his friend and patron," answered everyone.
"Every time, after there has been a kind of scene between them, the director
always gives an elegant supper with two place settings, and then the bagatelle is
forgotten.
friendship.
I looked over astonished at the young girl who had interfered with the director's
"Yes, just wait! It will not stay that way," she said with a triumphant smile.
"Watch out, my girl!" The company's old prompter dropped into the conversation
to warn her. "You cannot best the director, and he is capable of anything. If you fall out
with him, then you will immediately get your return ticket, and you must not imagine that
his friend will lift a finger to keep you!"
to prevail.
"I say: just wait!" continued the young girl, who no doubt counted on being able
Probably she attempted to do just that, but not many nights later there was a
confrontation in the lover's room between the director and her, and the next day she went
home to Denmark, and without any carafes being broken over it.
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