Brand
Characters in Brand
Brand
His mother
Einar, a painter
Agnes
The mayor
The doctor
The dean
The sexton
The schoolmaster
Gerd
A peasant
His young son
A second peasant
A woman
A second woman
A clerk
Priests and officials
Men, women and children of the district
The tempter in the wilderness
Invisible choir
A voice
Source: The Oxford Ibsen, Volume III, Oxford University Press 1972
Summary of plot
Brand is a young clergyman with a strong sense of vocation. He thinks that Christianity has been watered down and Christians have become slack and too willing to make compromises. He demands that faith and life must be one, and that human life must be ruled by willpower.
At the beginning of the play he is making his way across the mountains, and he meets his old schoolfriend Einar and the latter's fiancée Agnes. They are a very happy couple, but Brand condemns their attitude to life. Next he meets the mad gypsy girl Gerd, who imagines she is being pursued by a hawk. She tries to get Brand to go with her to an "ice church" in the mountains, but he goes down to the valley and his old home there. He finds there is famine in the district, which he believes is God's punishment for the people's lack of faith. He sails out on the fjord in a storm to hear the confession of a dying man, and Agnes is so moved by his courage and faith that she joins Brand in the boat, bidding Einar farewell. Agnes and Brand marry and have a son, Alf.
Brand serves the parish as clergyman, and when his elderly mother lies dying he refuses her holy communion unless she gives away all her possessions, and she dies without being absolved.
The little boy Alf is ill, and the doctor says they must move to a better climate to save his life and health. Brand interprets this warning as a temptation to give up his vocation, and gets Agnes to agree that they must stay. Alf dies, and so does Agnes, after being pressed by Brand to sacrifice all her treasured "relics" of their son.
Brand has gradually acquired a strong position among the country people, and he gets them to build a large new church. But on the day that the church is to be consecrated he realizes that this is not where the people are to seek their God, and he takes them all up into the mountains to find God up there instead. The parishioners lose courage, turn against Brand and return to the valley. Alone, Brand continues to wander through the mountains in search of God. He is tempted by the figure of Agnes to give up his demand for "all or nothing", but resists the temptation. He then meets Gerd again, who believes he is Christ himself. Gerd fires a rifle shot in the direction of the hawk she believes is pursuing her, and the shot sets off an avalanche, which buries the two of them.
Source: Merete Morken Andersen, Ibsenhåndboken, Gyldendal Norsk Forlag, 1995