The Theme of Failure in Ibsen's A Doll's House, In Sorrow's Kitchen: The Life and Folklore of Zora Neale Hurston, and the Novel True Notebooks

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Failure is one aspect of life that no one can avoid. The terror that comes from failure is that it has the power to break someone down to where they feel they can not get up and overcome the situation. Failing at a situation seems to make all hard work vanish in an instant, as if all the time and effort that was put forth into succeeding was never even there. Although failure can hurt and cause anxiety and even depression, it also allows a person to discover that even though they have been crushed they can still conquer it and succeed in the end. In A Doll House by Henrik Ibsen, failure was a common theme. One of the biggest failures of the play is Nora and Torvald’s inability to change themselves to make their marriage work. At the end of the play, desperate for answers, Torvald asks Nora to, “Tell [him] the greatest miracle!” (Ibsen 944). Nora responds telling Torvald, “You and I both would have to transform ourselves to the point that—that our living together could be a true marriage” (Ibsen 944). Nora and Torvald failed at the task of changing themselves in order for them to stay together and create a real and sincere marriage. The reason for the failure was that there was only one person in the marriage, which was Torvald. Torvald was the one who was constantly controlling Nora and treating her like a doll. He felt that Nora was only a childish woman who didn’t know anything about the outside world. The only way that the marriage could have succeeded was if the two were willing to put forth the time and effort. Nora deciding to leave is the effect of this failure. Now her children will be forced to live without their mother and Torvald will have to learn to cope with people of the society talking about him and his family... ... middle of paper ... ...oming back to juvenile hall or prison when released. If Antonio would have never stepped through the doors of that juvenile hall, he would have never been able to learn such a valuable lesson and quite possibly could have stayed in a life full of unlawful behavior that could have eventually taken his life. He has shown that even when you fail miserably, it is never too late to change and learn from your mistakes. Failure can cause a torrent of mixed emotions and thoughts. One can begin to doubt their motives for even attempting to succeed at a certain task. Some people may choose to give up after failure, but there are a select few who rise up to the occasion and move forward to try and succeed no matter how many tries it takes. By overcoming those difficult moments in life, it gives a person a sense of accomplishment and pride and that alone is a beautiful thing.

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