Summary
As Act 4 opens, Gina and Hedvig are waiting for Hialmar to return from his revelatory walk with Gregers. Upon entering, Hiamlar announces that, from now on, all studio affairs and home accounts are to be conducted himself: he no longer trusts Gina. He also announces that he will never set foot in the garret again, and when Hedvig reminds him that her birthday party is to be in the garret the following day, Hialmar assents but says that he wants to wring the wild duck's neck. Hedvig is terrified, and Hialmar suggests that she go outside for her eyes, which she does.
This then leaves Hialmar alone with Gina. Hialmar pressures Gina to confess about her intimacies with Werle, and while Gina does not deny a past relationship, she asserts that what happened between them happened only after the death of Gregers' mother, when Gina was no longer working with Werle. She also admits that Ekdal has been getting a great deal of money from Werle for his copy work, but that she only kept this information from Hialmar because it delighted him so much to think he was providing for his father alone. Gina tries to calm Hialmar down and reason with him, reminding him that she is a worldly and perspicacious woman who has helped Hialmar turn his life and business around. Hialmar acknowledges that this is the case, but he also is unable to escape the wounds of having been deceived by Gina and Werle.
Just then, Gregers enters and continues to press Hialmar to stay true to the ideals of truth, openness, and transparency. Just afterwards, Relling enters too. He learns of what Gregers has done, and verbally attacks Gregers for the unreality of his ideals, saying that no ideal or perfect marriage can exist in this world.
Right then, yet another person comes to the door. It is Mrs. Sörby, who has come to bid Gina farewell. She admits her intent to marry Werle and care for him, and she mentions that their trip to the Höidal works is partially fueled by Werle's encroaching blindness. Relling has a tense exchange with Mrs. Sörby, and it is implied that the two used to be romantically involved. He and Mrs. Sörby then leave separately.
Reflecting, Hialmar discusses his dismay with Gregers and states that he considers the news of Werle's blindness to be a kind of karmic retribution for his betrayal of the Ekdal family. Following this, however, Hedvig enters from the hall, saying that Mrs. Sörby has given her a gift for her birthday, which is on the following day, but that she is not meant to open it until then. Hialmar is upset about being kept in the dark once again, so they open the letter at once. It is a deed of gift, granting Old Ekdal a generous allowance of 100 crowns a month from Werle's office, and then passing this gift on to Hedvig for the entirety of her life.
This, combined with the news of Werle's eye disease, convinces Hialmar that Hedvig is not his daughter after all, but Werle's. Hialmar throws a tantrum, and Hedvig runs off. Hialmar then tears up the deed of gift. This whole realization pushes Hialmar to the breaking point, something that is only worsened when Gina says that she honestly cannot say for sure who Hedvig's father is. Hialmar vows never to return to their apartment, and he leaves, tearing Hedvig off of him when she tries to stop him.
Once again, then, Gregers has a moment with Hedvig in which he is able to manipulate her with his ideal philosophies. He tells her that, in order to convince her father that she loves him, she has to kill the wild duck, or else have her grandfather kill it for her. Gregers, Gina, and Hedvig then part, waiting to see how Hialmar returns the next day.
Analysis
Act 4 of the drama is where, literally and figuratively, the ghosts of characters' pasts return to haunt them. The most obvious application of this idea, of course, is with Gina, whose past affair with Werle has been dredged up by Gregers and laid before her feet by her husband Hialmar. Importantly, Gina asserts that Gregers is mistaken, and that she never had a relationship with him while she was employed by him. Though this is an important knock on Gregers' credibility, however, Hialmar is so upset at being betrayed that he does not even consider such shortcomings of Gregers.
Companion to this betrayal is also Gina's failure to tell Hialmar that Old Ekdal was being paid so liberally by Werle for his copy work. While Hialmar sees both as fundamental attempts to undermine him while centering Werle in their married life, Gina insists that she is more realistic and down to earth than that, deceiving Hialmar only as necessary to help him turn his life around and get him back on track. These alternate perspectives on the same issue are very important, since they mirror the perspectives of Gregers and Relling on truth and lies. If lies are able to keep one happy and help one advance in life, might they be better in certain circumstances than unfettered truth?
Relling, too, has a figure from his past return in Act 4. Just as he begins to argue with Gregers about the emptiness of his ideals, Mrs. Sörby, a former love interest of Relling's, arrives to bid Gina and others farewell. While Relling accuses Mrs. Sörby of marrying Mr. Werle just for his money (especially after her relationship with her past husband, who abused her), Mrs. Sörby's dialogue in this scene particularly emphasizes her practicality and even-headedness. She is a clear parallel for Gina in her commitment to her betrothed, regardless of the circumstances that brought them together, and also in her spurning by an overly emotional man. This dynamic is key because not only does it emphasize the potential importance of discarding romantic or naive ideals in favor of pragmatic behavior, but it also paints Relling as an unsympathetic and jealous person, all the more ironic because of the raisonneur role that he takes on in the drama's conclusion.
Mrs. Sörby's visit is also important because it represents the first time that Hialmar is made aware of Werle's hereditary blindness. Initially, Hialmar attributes the disease to a kind of ideal karmic retribution, but by the act's end, he comes to think of it in far cruder and more realistic terms—that is, that it could very well make Werle the father of his daughter. Together then, these elements of Mrs. Sörby's visit continue to undermine Gregers' romantic ideals and press forward the importance of everyday, practical life.
Similar movement is seen in Hialmar's reaction to the deed of gift given by Mrs. Sörby to Hedvig. When he first sees it and becomes aware of its possible significance, his outrage and obsession with Gregers' idealism drives him to tear the deed up. In Act 5, however, as we will see, his practical concern for his family and their financial well-being will incite a desire in him to have the document repaired.
In Gregers' last conversation with Hedvig in Act 4, much is also revealed. Hedvig reveals to Gregers that she has at least a partial understanding of her father's anger: though she does not fully comprehend the issue of paternity, she posits that perhaps she was found by her mother on the roadside, or else gifted to them like the wild duck. This draws the duck closer and closer to Hedvig as a symbolic parallel, a move that is only solidified when Gregers tells her to have the duck killed in order to prove her love for her father. Hedvig, after all, treasures the duck more than anything in the world, so to have it killed for her father is more or less tantamount to having an element of herself killed (something that is particularly grim considering Hedvig's ultimate fate in Act 5). The fact that Hedvig is willing to do so nonetheless, however, is a testament to her manipulation by Gregers, as well as the attractiveness of Gregers' so-called ideals to those uninitiated in the ways of everyday or common life (like not only Hedvig, but also Gregers himself).
