The Wild Duck

By

Henrik Ibsen

QUOTATION: Don’t use that foreign word “ideals.” We have that excellent native word “lies.”
ATTRIBUTION: Henrik Ibsen (1828–1906), Norwegian dramatist. Reilling, in The Wild Duck, act 5.

QUOTATION: Take the life-lie away from the average man and straight away you take away his happiness.
ATTRIBUTION: Henrik Ibsen (1828–1906), Norwegian dramatist. Reilling, in The Wild Duck, act 5 (1884).

QUOTATION: 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.
ATTRIBUTION: Henrik Ibsen (1828–1906), Norwegian dramatist. Hjalmar Ekdal, in The Wild Duck, act 4.