“A Doll House” by Henrik Ibsen and “The Glass Menagerie” by Tennessee Williams is full of lost hope and high expectations. Throughout these dramas the characters express confused emotions and actions that do not fair great results. The authors express the life styles of America’s middle and lower class families. In comparison to each other, these plays contain several different aspects of realistic and nonrealistic drama. In “A Doll House” Mrs. Linde represents the realistic roll in the drama. She is a very cut and dry lady that has dealt with a lot of hardships and sacrificed so much during her life that she sees no point in fantasizing about nonrealistic things. She is to the point and believes that you get only what you work for in life. On the other hand, Nora leads a very nonrealistic lifestyle. She is self-centered and has a very passive personality. She lets everyone else control her life while all the time she is stuck in a childlike state that effects every other situation that comes along. She struggles with responsibilities and everyday adult making decisions. Nora …show more content…
He is on a set path, and is determined to follow the plan that he has set for his life. Jim works and strives for success and even tries to help Laura come out of her shell and coupe with her disability by building her up and leaving no room for excuses. He knows the quality in life and tries to portray that meaning to both Laura and Tom. Tom describes Jim as “the most realistic character, being an emissary from that world of reality that we were set apart from (Johnson 1227)”. In the play Tom is very nonrealistic by living his irresponsible lifestyle. He spends his days dreaming of adventure and scribbling poems on shoe boxes. He likes to drink and party while avoiding paying bills so that he can use the money to escape the torture of everyday life. Jim thinks of his family as burden and is a very selfish
Ibsen, Henrik. A Doll House. The Wadsworth Anthology of Drama. Ed. W.B. Worthen. Boston: Thomson Wadsworth, 2007. 548-71. Print.
Oscar Wilde once said, “Everything in the world is about sex except sex. Sex is about power.” The content of this quote embodies A Doll’s House and The Glass Menagerie because of the sexual control in both the plays. A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen and The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee William, the characters, although from different time periods, face the hardships of sexual control through the men they admire. Nora is written as the naive protagonist of A Doll’s House, who embodies the themes of the novella as she matures throughout the play. Nora learns that her husband, Torvald, uses her as a doll for his own pleasure and does not truly care for her. In The Glass Menagerie, Laura, the main character, is also
The Glass Menagerie is an eposidic play written by Tennesse Williams reflecting the economic status and desperation of the American people in the 30s.He portrays three different characters going through these hardships of the real world,and choosing different ways to escape it.Amanada,the mother,escapes to the memories of the youth;Tom watches the movies to provide him with the adventure he lacks in his life;and laura runs to her glass menagerie.
In A Doll House, Nora and Torvald Helmer are an upper class, married couple who go about their lives in a way that their society would see as completely normal. Torvald works at a bank in which he recently received a large promotion that created a more than comfortable lifestyle for their family. Noticeably, Torvald serves as the provider for the home and focuses primarily on his work. Nora is a housewife and mother to their two children and has no expectations outside of the home. This lifestyle may come across as average for the time, however for Nora it created the feeling of resentment towards not only Torvald, but her home and children as well. She was confined in a home where she had the same daily routine until her husband came back from work, only to briefly discuss he...
Throughout the play, Williams highlights the importance of family dynamics and interaction in regards to shaping an individual, tacitly emphasizing how the characters in The Glass Menagerie are imprisoned by their environment and situation. Williams shows that Amanda’s nostalgic remembrance of her youth, Tom’s need to escape the Wingfield apartment, and Laura’s “inferiority complex” create a schism between reality and the characters’ perceptions of reality. As the characters in the play struggle with personal wants and needs, the family dysfunction further forms an imaginary bubble around the Wingfield apartment, crafting an atmosphere filled with unrequited love, unknown abilities, and unrealized goals. However, Williams is keen to note that the _______ actions of the characters can bring light the harsh realities of the world. In The Glass Menagerie, Williams illustrates the duality of fantasy and reality with the passive and active actions of the characters in an effort to illuminate that it is human nature to live in ignorance but realizes that humanity can only truly experience life after recognizing truth.
The Glass Menagerie is a fascinating play. In the Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, the story revolves around a girl name Laura Wingfield; her brother Tom and mother Amanda are secular characters who ignite Laura to solve her personal issues. In the Wingfield family, Tom and Amanda are very supportive and optimistic in concerns to Laura’s disability. As a single mother, Amanda’s one true pursuit American dream is getting gentlemen callers for Laura, which assents her to be married to a happy and satisfying life. Although the lives of the Wingfields may seem conclusive, encouraging and yet minor in pessimistic, Wingfields are nothing compared to the Cabot family of Eugene O’Neill’s, Desire Under the Elms. In Desire Under the Elms, the major American dream for the Cabot family is dominance over a plantation. Acquiring a plantation is everything to Eben Cabot, the youngest brother of the Cabot’s. Rather, considering marriage as a hopeful family stimulation like the Wingfields, the Cabot’s sees marriage as a negative outcome which gravely tears the family apart. Since the arrival of Eben’s new step-mother, Eben has been in defense over his rights of his family farm from Abbie. But the struggle in Eben was that Abbie will profit and Eben will be divested. This, Eben agonizes internally. In revere to the Cabot’s family ties, the three Cabot’s hate their father Ephraim for overworking them to death on the farm. Disrespect is perceived between the Cabot brothers and the father. Heedlessly, the father harasses Eben addressing that “Eben’s a dumb fool – like his Maw – soft an’ simple!” (O’Neill 967). This would not have been unacceptable in comparison to the Wingfields of the Glass Menagerie. Regarding the family ties in the Glass ...
Society as a gilded cage refers to people living a life with boundaries. The people living this type of life don’t live life to its full potential because they feel as though there are limits to what they can do. Two examples of individuals living this type of life would be Tom from a “Glass Menagerie” and Nora from “Doll House”. Both these individuals had the opportunity to live a free life but felt as though they had limits causing them to live a restrained life. Although both individuals seemed to be complete opposites they shared similar characteristics.
A Doll’s House, as a whole, explores themes of individuality and willpower through different characters. Nora discovers the need to enlighten herself without her father or husband’s imminent influence. On the other hand, Mrs. Linde, Nora’s old friend and Krogstad’s former lover, decides that her path to happiness would be with Krogstad, rather than alone like Nora. Regardless, the play represents multiple paths to find one’s own
Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House and Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard were famous for the way in which they depicted the changing of cultures. Both plays act as a sort of social commentary during times of widespread liberation, and use the contortive nature of these seemingly stereotypical characters’ actions to speak about groups of people as a whole. Throughout the course of both plays, this subversion of how different groups of people were typically perceived created a distinct contrast which often shocked and appalled audiences of the time. However, the effects of these plays were felt long after they were presented.
Henrik Ibsen paints a sad picture of the sacrificial role of women throughout all social economical classes in his play “A Doll House”. The story is set in the late 19th century and all minor female characters had to overcome adversity to the expense of love, family and self-realization, in order to lead a comfortable life. While the main female protagonist Nora struggles with her increasingly troubled marriage, she soon realizes, she needs to change her life to be happy as the play climaxes. Her journey to self-discovery is achieved by the threat of her past crime and her oppressing husband, Torvald and the society he represents. The minor female characters exemplifying Nora’s ultimate sacrifice.
If drama is a tension, then Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House must be an all-out war, with Ibsen taking on the role of a Realistic Period Patton. The play, first published in 1879, tells the story of Nora, a middle-aged house wife living in a society in which she has no rights or voice. However, with disregard to societal norms and the law, Nora forges her father’s signature to borrow money so that she and her family may go on a vacation that is responsible for saving her husband’s life. With Nora’s action unbeknownst to him, Nora’s husband, Torvald, fires the man from whom Nora loaned the money.
A Doll House was a play written well ahead of its time. This play was written in a time when it was considered an outrage for a woman such as Nora not only to display a mind of her own, but also to leave her husband in order to obtain her freedom. This play relates to the Art Nouveau and Edwardian period because just as the furniture and clothing were considered decorative pieces, so were women. Women were expected only to tend to the husband's and children's needs. Women were not supposed to do anything without first consulting the husband and certainly never do anything without his prior knowledge and approval. Women were expected to be at home and always looking presentable for their husbands.
It is an innate desire of all human beings to be successful. Indeed, with success comes a feeling of personal accomplishment, fulfillment, and pride. The prospect of such a future can drive many into great lengths to achieve their goal. While the ideal images of accomplishment may differ slightly from person to person, they are all ideals constructed by society. Unfortunately, society has a tendency to idealize these standards, placing them on a level that is both unreachable and impossible to achieve. As such, these unattainable images of success have driven numerous individuals into misery and hopelessness as they desperately attempt to reach that impossible ideal. For many, their own inevitable failures ultimately result in psychological turmoil and distress. Such is the case with the Wingfield household in Tennessee Williams' play The Glass Menagerie, which illustrates an American family's vain attempt at achieving the "American Dream". Through the portrayal of the deteriorating mental conditions of the Wingfields, Williams reveals the destructive psychological consequences of failing to meet societal standards of success.
In Henrik Ibsen’s play A Doll’s House, the personality of the protagonist Nora Helmer is developed and revealed through her interactions and conversations with the other characters in the play, including Mrs. Linde, Nils Krogstad, Dr. Rank and Ann-Marie. Ibsen also uses certain dramatic and literary techniques and styles, such as irony, juxtaposition and parallelism to further reveal interesting aspects of Nora’s personality. Mrs. Linde provides and interesting juxtaposition to Nora, while Krogstad initially provides the plot elements required for Nora’s character to fully expand in the play. Dr. Rank’s love for Nora provides irony and an interesting twist in their relationship, while Ann-Marie acts in a parallel role to Nora in that they are both away from their children for long periods of time. Nora Helmer’s character itself is minimally established and revealed at the beginning of the play, but the reader is further privy to her personality as the play progresses, as she interacts with each of the other minor characters in the play. Ibsen deliberately chooses to show Nora’s true self by revealing it in conversations between her and other characters; Mrs. Linde is one of these minor characters who is juxtaposed against Nora. Mrs. Linde married primarily for financial security and future ambitions while Nora sincerely believes that she married Torvald for love and happiness. This provides a conflict for the apparently childlike Nora as she realizes that her partner in the marriage probably didn’t marry her for the same reason. Also, an example of dramatic irony arises at the end of the play when Mrs. Linde’s relationship with Krogstad revives again while Nora’s marriage to Helmer crumbles. As Nora unhappily but determinedly leaves her home for a different life, Mrs. Linde’s happiness seems to be just beginning: "How different now! How different! Someone to work for, to live for - a home to build." These sentiments ironically portray the very qualities of married life that Nora desired to win, and keep throughout her life; and these feelings add to her established flair for the romantic. Since the main plot of A Doll’s House revolves around the debt incurred by Nora upon taking out a loan to pay for Helmer’s recovery, Krogstad functions primarily to set forth the series of actions, which propels much of the story. In contrast to Nora, who seems t...
In "A Doll's House", Ibsen portrays the bleak picture of a role held by women of all economic classes that is sacrificial. The female characters in the play back-up Nora's assertion that even though men are unable to sacrifice their integrity, "hundreds of thousands of woman have." Mrs. Linde found it necessary to abandon Krogstad, her true but poor love, and marry a richer man in order to support her mother and two brothers. The nanny has to abandon her children to support herself by working for Nora. Though Nora is economically advantaged, in comparison to the other female characters, she leads a hard life because society dictates that Torvald be the marriages dominant member. Torvald condescends Nora and inadvertently forces Nora to hide the loan from him. Nora knows that Torvald could never accept the idea that his wife, or any other woman, could aid in saving his life.