After reading “The Yellow Wallpaper” and following that, A Doll’s House I noticed that both female protagonists are being victimized of a patriarchal society. Along with becoming victims, they’re treated unfairly by the men in their lives, being locked in a room or being dressed up basically as if she were a doll and shown off like a trophy. These women did not take this treatment very well considering the narrator from “The Yellow Wallpaper” becomes insane and hysterical and Nora from A Doll’s House finally has enough of being treated like she’s a young child and finally walks out on her family. While the Narrator succumbed to the oppression, Nora did not and got enough courage built up even though it meant losing her husband and her children, …show more content…
John, her husband, believes that in order for her to get better, that they would have to move out to a place where they have separated rooms and once they’re moved in there, the narrator is locked up into a room with yellow wallpaper and a bed that looks as if it’s been bolted to the floor so it’s not moved. Her husband is a doctor therefore believing that her being alone and locked in a room will be the best thing for her to cure her depression; he visits her rarely and his sister Jane is her housekeeper to make sure everything is clean and visits the narrator seldomly. As the narrator stays locked up in the room, she starts staring at the hideous yellow wallpaper and starts seeing movement of a woman underneath the pattern and starts to lose all sanity. This yellow wallpaper is seen as her mind and how she’s trapped inside of her own mind which is causing her to go insane as well and it’s not just the yellow wallpaper making her go insane. Once she has destroyed the entire room and the wallpaper that was on the walls, her husband has come up to see her and realizes what she has done to the room and she tells him “I’ve got out at last, in spite of you and Jane. And I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me …show more content…
Nora’s role was to basically be a doll and be passive with little to no personality of her own and have others decide what she wanted for her. Although Nora did show her irresponsibility with money, she secretly goes behind her husbands’ back and pay off her debt without him knowing which shows that she can take care of herself and her own irresponsibility’s. With being accused of having sweets, spending too much money and just being treated like a child, Nora doesn’t know how else to act because of the way she was raised but, still tries to prove that can do something for herself even if it involves secretly working behind her husbands’ back. Nora kind of had to succumb to the oppression of her husband to hide her secret of him but at the end, she couldn’t hold it back anymore therefore giving her enough reason to stand up for herself and found freedom by leaving her husband and children behind. Although she lost her family, she gained her freedom to work like a man and pay off her own debt without being treated like a child or even a doll if
Throughout the play we never get to know who the real Nora is and what her true personality consists of. Nora also realizes that she does not know who she is, and decides to leave her life. She comments that she needs to discover who she is separate from her husband, children and more importantly society. Nora feels she is not respected, and she is a “doll” to her husband.
It is very interesting on how the narrator adds more to the story. Since the reader is only able to see what is the narrator feeling or thinking at the moment. We can’t see how other characters might be reacting around her, because it is only first person point of view. However, the narrator does begin to make the reader question what is really happening to her. All though she loves her bedroom, at some point in the story, the narrator begins to describe how much she hates the yellow wallpaper in her bedroom. Her hate towards the yellow wallpaper becomes an obsession, in which she describes that she “sees” a woman trapped in the wallpaper desperate to escape out of it. “…I kept still and watched the moonlight on that undulating wallpaper till I felt creepy. The faint figure behind seemed to shake the pattern, just as if she wanted to get out.”-(652). With the narrator taking medication, sleeping in separate rooms from her husband, and now having illusions of a woman being trapped in the wallpaper. The reader can analyze that the narrator is most likely going through a depression or some type of mental
Jane is diagnosed with “.temporary nervous depression [and] a slight hysterical tendency.” (Gilman 648). Although she realizes there is more to her illness than temporary nervousness, her husband time after time ignores her wishes, claiming to know best for her. John shoves her in an isolated environment with little to no mental activity; this drives Jane to project her emotions onto the room with special attention to the yellow wallpaper.
In the 1800’s, women were considered a prize to be won, an object to show off to society. They were raised to be respectable women whose purpose was to marry into a higher social class in order to provide for their family. These women were stuck in a social system which seemed impossible to escape. Henrik Ibsen, a Norwegian playwright, saw these barriers and wrote one of the most controversial plays of his time, “A Dolls House”. In his play, Ibsen argues the importance of opposite sex equality in marriage by using his character, Nora Helmer, to bring to light how degrading the roles of women were in the 1800’s.
In both the works A Doll House by Henrik Ibsen and "The Birthmark" by Nathaniel Hawthorne, we encounter the conflict of women being oppressed and fighting for they roles as human beings; seeking freedom from their homes and husbands. Both Nora's and Georgina's husband were oppressors of their women's choices. They were objects to their husbands and their obligations were their household, their families and becoming their husband's pride and trophy. In A Doll House, though Nora is oppressed, Ibsen gives her abilities to reciprocate the roles in the household which displays the empowerment of women in the 19th century just beginning and maybe the influence of many more empowerment movements to come. In "The Birthmark", Hawthorne displays the horrifying outcomes of controlling husbands, the way Georgina risked her life to let her husband remove the birthmark on her face that her husband despises.
During the time in which the play took place society frowned upon women asserting themselves. Women were supposed to play a role in which they supported their husbands, took care of their children, and made sure everything was perfect around the house. Work, politics, and decisions were left to the males. Nora's first break from social norms was when she broke the law and decided to borrow money to pay for her husband's treatment. By doing this, she not only broke the law but she stepped away from the role society had placed on her of being ...
Because her husband, John, does not take her illness seriously and neglects to get her out of the house, her mind cannot take it and she loses her sanity. It should be clear to the reader, since she thinks she and the imaginary woman has worked together to pull the wallpaper down that she believes the women in the yellow wallpaper and she are both trapped and are both working together to escape. (200) Likewise, when she tells John, “I got out at last”, and, “in spite of you and jane! And I pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back”, By her saying this to John tells you she thinks she is free, because she has torn down the yellow wallpaper. She is no longer saying anything about a woman being in the wallpaper, because in her mind, she is now the
The narrator claimed that there was a woman trapped by bars in the wallpaper. It is like a prison that she is stuck in and coincides with the narrator as she is also forced to sit inside a room alone. It is also symbolic of John and his wife’s relationship. As the narrator looks deeper and deeper into the wallpaper she is really just observing her life. The yellow wallpaper really changes the narrator and her mind and she begins to dislike John. The narrator is dealing with postpartum depression and many people that are depressed are usually stuck inside their own minds. It’s like your vision is just a window you can see out of, but cannot escape. The narrator is seeing herself in the wallpaper and trying to escape because she is also trying to escape her depression. Close to the end of the story John’s wife starts to rip apart the yellow wallpaper and when she is ripping it is like she is helping the woman inside the wallpaper which is really her, to
During the time in which the play took place society frowned upon women asserting themselves. Women were supposed to play a role in which they supported their husbands, took care of their children, and made sure everything was perfect around the house. Work, politics, and decisions were left to the males. Nora's first secession from society was when she broke the law and decided to borrow money to pay for her husbands treatment. By doing this, she not only broke the law but she stepped away from the role society had placed on her of being totally dependent on her husband. She proved herself not to be helpless like Torvald implied: "you poor helpless little creature!"
In Henrik Ibsen's, A Doll's House, the character of Nora Helmer goes through the dramatic transformation of a kind and loving housewife, to a desperate and bewildered woman, whom will ultimately leave her husband and everything she has known. Ibsen uses both the characters of Torvald and Nora to represent the tones and beliefs of 19th century society. By doing this, Ibsen effectively creates a dramatic argument that continues to this day; that of feminism.
Nora’s life struggle began at a young age. Her father treated her like an inhuman object, and now her husband has done the same thing. After many years of maintaining her “perfect” life, Nora could no longer live like this. She finally stands up for herself and makes a choice to leave her family. This decision is completely reasonable. It is unimaginable to think anyone could treat another person so crudely. No person should be molded into being someone they are not. It is unfair to treat a loved one like an object instead of an equal human being. Unfortunately there are many women today who find themselves in the same position in Nora. Many of which do not have the strength to confront, and to pry themselves from grips of their abusers. It is possible that the greatest miracle will be Nora, out on her own, finding her true self.
Nora 's character is a little bit complicated. she is a representative of women in her time and shows how women were thought to be a content with the luxuries of modern society without worrying about men 's outside world. However, Nora proves that this idea is entirely wrong. Nora is not a spendthrift as all people think specially her husband. on the contrary, she has a business awareness and she is mature
The inferior role of Nora is extremely important to her character. Nora is oppressed by a variety of "tyrannical social conventions." Ibsen in his "A Doll's House" depicts the role of women as subordinate in order to emphasize their role in society. Nora is oppressed by the manipulation of Torvald. Torvald has a very typical relationship with society.
In the play A Doll’s House, Nora 's sacrificial role as a women is considered to be more like a housewife. Her husband Helmer only gives her so much money each week to spend on money and other necessities. Throughout the play Nora is being blackmailed by Krogstad because instead of her father signing for the loan she did. Women back then were not allowed to take out loans only men. Women during the time of the play A Doll’s House, were treated very differently they did not have the same rights as men and were constantly having to make their husbands happy. This is a little similar today, but a lot has changed since then. Women now are more independent and have more freedom to do as they please.
At the beginning of "A Doll's House", Nora seems completely happy. She responds to Torvald's teasing, relishes in the excitement of his new job, and takes pleasure in the company of her children and friends. Nora never appears to disagree with her doll-like existence, in which she is cuddled, pampered and patronized. As the play progresses, Nora's true character appears and proves that she is more than just a "silly girl" as Torvald calls her. Her understanding of the business details related to the dept she incurred in taking out a loan to help Torvald's health shows her intelligence and her abilities beyond being merely a wife. The secret labor she undertakes to pay off her dept demonstrates her determination and ambition. In addition, her willingness to break the law in order to aid her...