ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces each of the survivors, and the state in which they leave their parents, in order to open a new argument about reproduction in Henrik Ibsen: survival makes no difference. Elinor Fuchs asserts that Ibsen depicts the older generation as “vampires” in John Gabriel Borkman, desperate to make good by feeding on new life-blood. Irene claims that her former life with Rubek can have no “resurrection,” but they both decide that they can continue to play games together. Irene claims that her former life with Rubek can have no “resurrection,” but they both decide that /“child,” approaching its attitudes, replaying its figuration in real-life theater. Ibsen also uses survivors to show that the impossibility of signing one’s child or one’s statue is no obstruction to the persistence of vision, regardless of diminishing temporal horizons or challenges to potency and creativity.
