Living in a society where women were viewed as codependent on men, Henrik Isben’s character Nora Helman challenged this mentality. This story challenged the social and marital norms of men and women with a controversial conclusion. Some were critical of Isben’s ending so he wrote a different outcome that would have pleased audiences more but not have had such a powerful message. In Ibsen’s A Doll’s House, despite censorship and audience resistance, the original ending written by Ibsen is undoubtedly the best ending. In A Doll’s House, Nora experiences an epiphany that triggers development in her character. In the beginning of the story, Nora is not only content in her life, but also happy – or so she makes herself out to be. She acts happy, …show more content…
Readers learn that the relationship between Torvald and Nora to be more of a father-daughter one as opposed to them being husband and wife. Their marriage is deemed unhealthy for that reason; Torvald treats Nora as his daughter, not his wife. In the time period of this work, the idea that a woman is nothing more than a child in an adult’s body was typical and traditional. They were expected to be “without mind, but with much heart, devoid of logic, but sensitive and intrusive” (Valency, 253). This is what made Ibsen’s ending extremely controversial. Nora is “given” a mind and uses logic to realize what has become of her past and present lifestyles. She does the opposite of what was expected from female characters in this time. The ending challenged what rights women had at a time where it was thought they were nothing more than a man’s wife, or a father’s daughter – always under the control of men and unable to make right decisions on their own. Ibsen was strong enough to keep this ending, the better of them, for the text instead of succumbing and changing the conclusion just to be accepted and approved by …show more content…
One of the edits to the story was to have Nora commit suicide. Towards the end of Act III, Nora envisions her death when Torvald has gone to read the letter expressing what Nora has done. Suicide is sometimes viewed as the ultimate weakness, or being too strong for too long. If this would have been incorporated into the story, the meaning and impact would have been far less. Nora would have been seen as taking the easy way out, and Torvald would have gotten sympathy as a victim. Ibsen published an alternate ending to A Doll’s House that gave audiences a peak of just how controlling Torvald was. Instead of Nora walking out on her husband and children, Torvald dragged Nora back to the children’s room to look at them one last time. Nora ends up collapsing in tears in the doorway of their room and stays with Torvald. This ending gives Torvald the triumph over Nora because he knew if he used the children to make her feel guilty for even considering leaving that she would stay. Both of these edits to the plot line are not as influential as the original ending. If this ending would have been applied by Ibsen, the story would not have been about women’s right, but just a story for entertainment purposes (Braddock,
In the nineteenth century, female independence was considered unimaginable and was deemed as wrong. Nora’s desire to leave her home life was obvious throughout the play, but she had constant doubts. The slam of the door, in the last scene, is very significant because a woman walking out on her family was such a rare occurrence. ”To desert your home,your husband and your children!And don’t you consider what people will say.”(807). As said before,Torvald seemed extremely worried over how his peers would view him as a divorcé.
Throughout A Doll’s House, Henrik Ibsen illustrates through an intriguing story how a once infantile-like woman gains independence and a life of her own. Ibsen creates a naturalistic drama that demonstrates how on the outside Nora and Torvald seam to have it all, but in reality their life together is empty. Instead of meaningful discussions, Torvald uses degrading pet names and meaningless talk to relate to Nora. Continuing to treat Nora like a pampered yet unimportant pet, Torvald thoroughly demonstrates how men of his era treat women as insignificant items to be possessed and shown off. While the Helmer household may have the appearance of being sociably acceptable, the marriage of Torvald and Nora was falling apart because of the lack of identity, love, and communication.
Throughout the change from a carefree doll into an independent woman who is finally finding herself, we see that Nora is acting the way she does due to society. She has lost herself due to being a wife and a mother. Society is typically male dominant and because of the roles she has to fulfill, she lost herself.
A Doll House shows the protagonist, Nora, being treated by the men in her life as nothing more than a “doll” to dress
The problem with suicide is that it can be depicted as the greatest form of courage and the ultimate weakness. As a strength, suicide is Nora’s last bid for complete control of her life by removing herself from society completely. As a weakness, suicide leaves Nora vulnerable for being a scapegoat for the shame brought upon her family. Suicide also paints Torvald as the victim, Nora was an unfit wife and mother who abandoned her family through death. The abandonment of her children through death leaves no chance for Nora to be able to reconnect with them like she would be able to if she were to strike out on her own looking for her independence. Nora’s children would have psychological problems that would leave them emotionally damaged and leave them with enormous guilt. Suicide presents the same problem the ending in which Nora stays with her family does, reinforcing the role of women as being repressed and controlled by a patriarchal society. This alternate ending does not highlight the message Ibsen was trying to portray like Ibsen’s original
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.
This becomes one of the main driving forces of Ibsen’s play. (Quote from Torvald and the money). It immediately distinguishes the differences in gender roles and morals in Norway during the late 1800’s. While Nora is willing to give the porter twice what is owed, we assume she is full of holiday spirit; Torvald has a much more sensible outlook on financial concerns. While he jokingly calls her his little spendthrift, he asserts that her lack of understanding is a result of her gender “Nora, my Nora, that is just like a woman” (Ibsen). Torvald believes that her place in the home is simply ornamental, a trophy that serves as decoration for his home. Torvald is constantly referring to her through the use of pet names such as (quote pet names from book) and only ever refers to her by name when he is scolding her. Not only does Torvald see her as his doll, but also as her child (quote near end of story). By keeping Nora dependent and obedient to him, he plays the role of Nora’s second father. Nora eventually sees that her daughter is being treated in the same manner that she was her entire life, as a
Edvard Beyer quoted in Aderholts translation of the Henrik Ibsen play, “There is hardly a single line that does not have a demonstrable dramatic function…. And all of a sudden single everyday words take on a double meaning of foreboding undertones.” (2) Nora’s “important thing” and Mrs. Linde’s “[y]ou are a child” are just a few exhibits of Ibsen’s double meanings. “Important thing,” the misrepresentation, a secret, laid the foundation of colored building blocks of their eight years of marriage. Is this truly the start of that first lying block Nora so easily laid down? No, it started with the injustices her father played upon her; treating her as his little doll, a doll to play dress-up and present his doting daughter to others. Subsequently, it was not hard for Torvald to continue Nora’s life as a living doll; his own game within as she is a willing subject. “[Quite] right, Christine. You see, Torvald loves me so indescribably, he wants to have me all to himself, as he says.” (Act II 54) Reveals how Torvald wants his toy all to himself; all along Nora knowing this she plays along with the game. While she keeps Torvald from finding out her biggest secret, she knowingly continues to play the role of Nora the doll; helpless without direction from the puppet master. Impressively Ibsen’s suggestions are lines of double meaning and the game of manipulation between Nora and those surrounding
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 from Torvald. Torvald has a very typical relationship with society. He is a smug bank manager. With his job arrive many responsibilities. He often treats his wife as if she is one of these responsibilities. Torvald is very authoritative and puts his appearance, both social and physical, ahead of his wife that he supposedly loves. Torvald is a man that is worried about his reputation, and cares little about his wife's feelings.
...e traditional role of women in a patriarchal society when she forges a signature to secure a bank loan. Initially this rebellious act illustrates her as childish and deceptive person, who is concerned about the Helmer’s reputation. However by the end of the play, Nora Helmer become independent as she weaves her way through her husband’s overbear rules durable by making her own rules to make, which eventually causes her to leave. Her reasons for leaving are that she had lived her whole life as a doll and she needed to find her true self. Henrik Ibsen’s underlying purpose in characterizing Nora Helmer as dynamic was to illustrate her struggles in living a typical Norwegian marriage. Ibsen was trying to convey how a couple in a Norwegian marriage was not union and did not split power among the couple equally. The males of the marriage had superiority over their wives.
The enforcement of specific gender roles by societal standards in 19th century married life proved to be suffocating. Women were objects to perform those duties for which their gender was thought to have been created: to remain complacent, readily accept any chore and complete it “gracefully” (Ibsen 213). Contrarily, men were the absolute monarchs over their respective homes and all that dwelled within. In Henrik Ibsen’s play, A Doll’s House, Nora is subjected to moral degradation through her familial role, the consistent patronization of her husband and her own assumed subordinance. Ibsen belittles the role of the housewife through means of stage direction, diminutive pet names and through Nora’s interaction with her morally ultimate husband, Torvald. Nora parades the façade of being naïve and frivolous, deteriorating her character from being a seemingly ignorant child-wife to a desperate woman in order to preserve her illusion of the security of home and ironically her own sanity. A Doll’s House ‘s depiction of the entrapment of the average 19th century housewife and the societal pressures placed upon her displays a woman’s gradual descent into madness. Ibsen illustrates this descent through Torvald’s progressive infantilization of Nora and the pressure on Nora to adhere to societal norms. Nora is a woman pressured by 19th century societal standards and their oppressive nature result in the gradual degradation of her character that destroys all semblances of family and identity.Nora’s role in her family is initially portrayed as being background, often “laughing quietly and happily to herself” (Ibsen 148) because of her isolation in not only space, but also person. Ibsen’s character rarely ventures from the main set of the drawi...
A Doll 's house is one of the modern works that Henrik Ibsen wrote. He was called the father of modern drama .He was famous for writing plays that related to real life. A Doll 's House is a three-act play that discusses the marriage in the 19th century. It is a well-made play that used the first act as an exposition. The extract that will be analyzed in the following paragraphs is a dialogue between Nora and the nurse that takes care of her children. This extract shows how she was afraid not only of Krogstad blackmail, but also of Torvald 's point of view about those who committed any mistake. Torvald says that the mothers who tell lies should not bring up children as they are not honest . Nora is also lying to her family and to Torvald. So she is afraid because she thinks she maybe 'poisoning ' her own children. The analysis of this extract will be about of Nora 's character, the theme, and the language in A Doll 's House.
In Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll House, a drama written in the midst of an 1879, middle-class, suburban Europe, he boldly depicts a female protagonist. In a culture with concern for fulfilling, or more so portraying a socially acceptable image, Nora faces the restraints of being a doll in her own house and a little helpless bird. She has been said to be the most complex character of drama, and rightfully so, the pressure of strict Victorian values is the spark that ignites the play's central conflicts. Controversy is soon to arise when any social-norm is challenged, which Nora will eventually do. She evolves throughout the play, from submissive housewife to liberated woman. It seems as though what took women in America almost a century to accomplish, Nora does in a three-day drama. Ibsen challenges the stereotypical roles of men and women in a societally-pleasing marriage. He leads his readers through the journey of a woman with emerging strength and self-respect. Nora plays the typical housewife, but reveals many more dimensions that a typical woman would never portray in such a setting.
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...
While it was important to highlight the oppression of women in marriage and Nora’s dramatic exit served a valuable purpose to Ibsen’s thesis, It may have also been very effective if the last scene ended less shockingly. Audiences would have dealt more calmly with an ending in which Nora did not completely desert her family. If the end were different it may have benefited the overall mission of the play in ways, such as, more people attending shows and gaining the message without disturbing their moral beliefs too much. Also, the avoidance of a cliff hanger, an attribute of dramas that does not get along with many in the light of such a controversial topic. An alternate ending composed so that Nora could find herself and return with her family may have increased the approval of, A Doll's House, and allow it to end on a more settling note.