Hedda's desire for beauty was more complex than it seemed; she desired the things in life that money couldn't give her, like enlightenment and truth. Hedda desired to have prospective power over words because she had no other power in society. However, she eventually retreated into silence, as did other European women of the late 19th century. Hedda's suicide can be considered a suicide of beauty because it is her final act of freedom. By committing suicide, she takes back all the power that the male-dominated society had over her. It can even be said that the women watching this play in 19th century European society may have felt so connected to it because they realized that they too could be freed from the society that had forced them to