"A Doll House" A critical Analysis When Nora slammed the door shut in her doll's house in 1879, her message sent shockwaves around the world that persist to this day. "I must stand quite alone", Nora declared after finding out that her ideal of life was just a imagination of her and that all her life had been build up by others people's, specifically her husband and her dad ideas, opinions and tastes. Nora is the pampered wife of an aspiring bank manager Torvald Halmer. In a desperate attempt to saves her husband's life Nora once asked for a loan so she and her family could move somewhere where her husband could recover from his sickness. Giving the circumstances she, as a woman of that period, by herself and behind her husband forged her dad signature to receive the loan. Now, Nora's lender (Mr. Krogstad), despite her paying punctually, uses that fault as a fraud to pressure her so she could help him to keep his job in the Bank where her husband is going to be the manager. Nora finds out that Torvald would fire Mr. Krogstad at any cost. At learning this, Nora trembles for she knows Mr. Krogstad will tell everything to Torvald. She remains confident; however that Torvald will stand by her no matter what outcome. His reaction though is not what she expected and therefore here is when she realizes that she "must stand quite alone" and leaves her husband. From the time A Doll's House was performed for first time (1879) till now, there have been all sorts of interpretation and critics about its message. According to Mr. Mayer's files critics considered that the A Doll's House message was that "a marriage was not sacrosanct, that a man's authority in his home should not go unchallenged". Another similar critics' interpretat... ... middle of paper ... ... Johnston, Brian. Text and Supertext in Ibsen's Drama. Pennsylvania : The Pennsylvania State University , 1932. 2. Templeton, Joan. Ibsen's Women. Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 1997. 3. Tennant, P.F.D. Ibsen's Dramatic Technique. New York : Hummanities Press Inc., 1948. 4. Meyer, Michael. Ibsen's on file. London and New York : Methuen London Ltd., 1985. 5. Ford, Karen. "Social contrains and painful growth in A Doll's House". Expanded Academic ASAP. Methodist College , Fayetteville , NC . 30 Octuber 2005 6. Hopkins, Anthony and Bloom Claire. A Doll's House video recording. Southgate Entertainment." 1989. 7. Rekdal, Anne Marie. " The female Jouissance An Analysis of Ibsen's Et dukkehjem. Expanded Academic ASAP. Methodist College , Fayetteville , NC . 30 Octuber 2005
Meyer, Michael. "Ibsen: A Biographical Approach." Ibsen and the Theatre: The Dramatist in Production. Ed. Errol Durbach. New York: New York UP, 1980. 14-26. Print.
Simonds, W. E. "Henrik Ibsen." Dial 10.119 (Mar. 1890): 301-303. Rpt. in Literature Resource Center. Detroit: Gale, 2011. Literature Resource Center. Web. 25 Mar. 2011.
Nora is presented with many choices, one of them being the option to lie to her husband, Torvald, or not to lie. Most of these tiny, white lies include when Nora tells Torvald that she has not eaten macarons. She goes about her choice to lie in a way that she believes is rational. Nora also has the foresight to weigh her options. If she lies to Torvald, they will have a happy marriage, but if Nora deceives him, everything will crumble beneath her feet. Choosing the former, Nora lives in fear that Torvald will discover her, but is happy living in falsehood. Eventually it becomes normal for Nora to lie, almost like nothing is wrong. Although, deep down inside, Nora is hiding a greater secret from Torvald, underneath all the tiny white lies. This falsehood regards a large sum of money that she borrows to save her husband 's life. Nora has acquired a lump sum from Nils Krogstad, that she knows she does not have the means to pay back in full by his set deadline. Nora’s fear of Torvald finding out weighs heavily in her decision of how to go about breaking even with
In Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll House the main character, Nora Helmer, shows us the story of a woman who has borrow money without her husband’s consent in order to save his life. Although this noble act would be admired by most, Nora has to keep it a secret from Torvald Helmer, her husband, as he would see it as a betrayal. The measures that Nora takes in order to keep the loan a secret, create circumstances that bring Nora—whose only duty is to serve her husband— to discover that her life can be more than just being an accessory to her husband. She becomes her own self. In her struggle to keep the borrowed money from her husband’s knowledge Nora begins a transformation from dependence of Torvald, to being self-efficient, self-worthy, and self-independent—qualities women of her time lacked of—because all, such as Nora never displayed a mind of their own. At the end, when Nora’s secret is revealed to Torvald and his reaction is to condemn her for borrowing the money, Nora realizes that she no longer fears her husband’s reaction; she is no longer worried of keeping appearances of what society says she should be as a wife, and mother. The secret that Nora tries very hard to keep hidden, gives her the opportunity to discover herself as an individual, and what she is capable of doing regardless the constraints of society.
Linde brings great happiness to Nora’s life. Nora is able to trust and talk about anything to Mrs. Linde (even secrets such as borrowing money behind your husband’s back). When Nora and Mrs. Linde engage in conversation with each other it is as if Mrs. Linde is the voice of reason for Nora. In one scene, Nora tells Mrs. Linde , “ You’re like everybody else. You all think I’m incapable of doing anything serious…” Again, I feel sorry for her, but at this moment I assumed that maybe Nora is not as naive as I thought. She is able to recognize that people see her as a childish person. In another part of this scene she mentions to Mrs. Linde, ”Torvald has his pride. He’d feel humiliated-hurt even- if he thought he was indebted to me in anyway." Nora is afraid of how humiliated her husband would be if he found out his wife did something that overpowered him. Since Mrs. Linde she believes that it is absurd that Nora would do such thing to her husband. Mrs. Linde recognizes that women do not have the same rights as men, therefore realizing what Nora did for her husband seem to raise a red
Nora is the beloved, adored wife of Torvald Helmer. He is well respected, and has just received a promotion to the bank manager. Torvald also obtains high moral standards but he is very controlling and materialistic. During the first scene the couple is discussing the issue of borrowing money. Torvald says to Nora "…you know what I think about that. No debts! Never borrow! Something of freedom’s lost-and something of beauty, too- from a home that’s founded on borrowings and debt. We’ve made a brave stand up to now, the two of us, and we’ll go right on like that the little way we have to."
Mrs. Linde, a childhood friend of Nora's, and Dr. Rank, Torvald's best friend, both arrive at the Helmer home at the same time. Dr. Rank retires to Torvald's study, and Mrs. Linde reacquaints with Nora. The two have not seen one another in about a decade. Nora acts very much like a naïve child throughout the conversation with her friend. She tells Mrs. Linde about Torvald's approaching appointment to bank manager and expresses how relieved she is that they will soon have all the money they...
Northam, John. 1965. "Ibsen's Search for the Hero." Ibsen. A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall.
...ing of what he may have once declared to be truth. Ibsen uses Rank to make these truths about Nora and Torvald's personalities evident to the reader.
Henrik Ibsen. Hedda Gabler. Trans. Edmung Goose and William Archer. Stilwell, KS: Digireada.com Publishing, 2005.
Northram, John. "Ibsen's Search for the Hero." Ibsen: A Collection of Critical Essays. Ed. Rolf Fjelde. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1965. 107-113.
It sometimes takes a lifetime to change yourself, but changing in response to what other people want, without considering your own needs could be much more challenging. In a world without any flaws all people would be treated equally and with the same kind of respect. On the other hand, in the world we live in, almost all situations we find ourselves in have the potential to become a conflict. A Doll's House, a play by Henrik Ibsen, is an exceptional example of a conflict that exists as women are seen as possessions and not individuals by men. Ibsen uses the Christmas tree, macaroons, tarantella, and the doll’s house as symbols in A Doll’s House to express the flaws in a society that requires women to be the subservient and docile servants of men.
As the play goes on, Nora seems to transform from her delicate little character into something much more. At the end of act one, Krogstad goes to Nora for the recollection of the money she had borrowed from him. "You don?t mean that you will tell my husband that I owe you money?" (21). Since Nora was wrong in doing so socially, she could not tell Torvald or anyone else about her problem. Not only would that affect their social standard but also Torvald's ego, which inevitably would happen anyway. After Krogstad threatens to expose Nora for forging her father's signature, she realizes that no matter what she does Torvald was going to know the truth. The flaw with...
He critiques conventions and institutions by categorically acknowledging the human dependence to unlawful ends and social legitimacy accorded to them through religious establishments.He covertly makes a socio-political statement representing a collaboration of nobility and religious institution in crafting an illusive reality of life- serving fodder to the populist perception- thereby undermining truth to the margin of subversive discourse.The philosophical importof Ibsen is directed towards obligations produced by outmoded beliefs and ideals of ‘duty’; the truth hence iscircumscribed by the need to remain dutiful and the pragmatic presence of lies/illusion becomes the inviolablepolitics of
For various reasons, the role of women in society has been analyzed and frequently debated throughout history. Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House is no exception to the rule. In Norway, and during the Victorian period in history, women’s responsibilities were simply to keep house or do small jobs on the side such as sewing or light secretarial work. Henrik Ibsen may have had several intentions when writing his play A Doll’s House, but the one that stands out so clearly is the role of women in the time period from which the play takes place and just how doll-like they were treated in Victorian society. Women during this period were by no means the decision-makers of their households. Husbands or fathers were the heads of the household and many times women didn’t even know what state their financial affairs were in. It was often times only when something drastic happened that a woman would become aware of these things. For instance, if a husband should fall sick or even pass away and there were no male relatives to help take care of things, often times the woman would have to step up and distinguish what needed to be done in order to take care of things. We see a variation of this situation in Ibsen’s play. We meet a woman, Nora, and her husband Torvald and in it we witness the deterioration of their life together through Nora’s eyes. Throughout this analysis of A Doll’s House, I will address several things concerning Ibsen’s play. I will give a synopsis of the play, an analysis of three major characters: a.) Nora, b.) Torvald, and c.) Krogstad. I will discuss the language of the play and themes. I will give an in-depth look at the playwright himself as well as information on his creation of the play. I will give an idea of ...