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Nora's character and symbolism in a doll's house
Nora's character and symbolism in a doll's house
Gender roles during the Victorian era
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Romantic relationships have the capability of bringing out the best and the worst in people. In a healthy relationship, partners complement one another. The love and support they offer not only strengthens their bond; it can make them stronger as individuals too. An unhealthy relationship can have quite the opposite effect. The wrong partner can influence a person to become someone they have no desire to be. In his play A Doll’s House, Henrik Ibsen demonstrates the impact that equality and honesty can have on relationships.
A Doll’s House is set during a time when neither men nor society treated women as equals. Women were expected to be content as dutiful housewives. Nora and Torvald’s relationship reflects the unbalanced society. In Torvald’s eyes men are superior to women. Preoccupied with how society perceives him, he is appalled at the thought of others believing that his wife would have any input whatsoever in his decisions; “Do you suppose I am going to make myself ridiculous before my whole staff, to let people think I am a man to be swayed by all sorts of outside influence?” (Ibsen 35). Torvald controls practically everything; he finds power in her weakness and declares to her “I should not be a man if this womanly helplessness did not just give you a double attractiveness in my eyes” (Ibsen 64). Nora only has say over insignificant aspects of daily life, such as shopping or decorating for Christmas. In the beginning she is not bothered by the fact that Torvald treats her like his possession. Her father also treated her as an object, so she believes that is how they express their love for her. By the end of the play Nora comes to the heartbreaking realization that Torvald and her father have held her back by using her for...
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...owing his love is through his actions. He may blackmail Nora, but he feels it’s a task that is necessary in order to keep his job and provide for his children. To show Kristine his love, he ends the extortion by delivering the bond to the Helmer’s box, thereby clearing them from any illegal crime.
Kristine and Krogstad have been lucky enough to have achieved self-awareness. They know that they need each other in order to succeed in this society. Nora never had the chance to find herself before she married Torvald. In order for them to grow as individuals they need to separate. The dissolution of their marriage is necessary; staying together would only keep them repeating the same habits. Partners can either help us in becoming the person we need to be, or they can hinder that growth. Having the right person by our side has the potential to determine who we become.
In Henrik Ibsen’s play A Doll House, Ibsen tells a story of a wife and mother who not only has been wronged by society, but by her beloved father and husband because of her gender. Nora left her father’s house as a naïve daughter only to be passed to the hands of her husband forcing her to be naïve wife and mother, or so her husband thinks. When Nora’s husband, Torvald becomes deathly ill, she takes matters into her own hands and illegally is granted a loan that will give her the means to save her husband’s life. Her well guarded secret is later is used against her, to exort Torvald, who was clueless that his wife was or could be anything more than he made her. However, Nora has many unrecognized dimensions “Besides being lovable, Nora is selfish, frivolous, seductive, unprincipled, and deceitful” (Rosenberg and Templeton 894). Nora is a dynamic character because her father and her husband treat her as a child and do not allow her to have her own thoughts and opinions, as the play progresses she breaks free from the chains of her gender expectation to explore the world around her.
In “A Dollhouse,” Nora is stuck in a marriage with a rich man who has no respect for her. Nora’s husband Torvald, does not think his
In society’s view, the marriage between Nora and Torvald is a wonderful relationship. Torvald supports the family through his job at the bank while Nora is the caretaker for the children. However, they have no real communication between them. Torvald commonly refers to Nora as his “little lark” or “squirrel” (1010, 1012). He never treats Nora as an equal marital partner, much less an individual. In the end, the marriage has to end because of its lack of real communication. Thus, a source of deception in the play stems from the fact that the actual marriage between Nora and Torvald is not a healthy relationship, as in society’s view. Furthermore, when Nora decides to go against her husband’s will to borrow the money for the loan, she forsakes her matrimonial bond, yet gains personal independence. Nora considers the loan “something to be proud and happy for” (1017). Yet, in essence, she is pleased with her ability to lie to her husband. Through this circumstance, Ibsen successfully reveals that a relationship built on ...
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.
Nora and Torvald lack one of the key elements needed to make a marriage work. Good communication allows you to better understand your partners needs and to unite as a team to solve problems or comply. When Torvald got sick and the only thing to save his life was to move to the south; Nora found a way to procure the money and forged her father’s signature to obtain the loan. The most heroic action of her life is an unforgivable crime in the eyes of society. Nora has kept this a secret from Torvald. “A man who has such strong opinions about these things! And besides, how painfully and humiliating it would be for Torvald, with his manly independence, to know that he owed me anything! It would upset our mutual relations altogether; our beautiful happy home would no longer be what it is now.”(12) To pay back the loan, Nora has worked without her husband’s consent, staying up late nights copying, to earn money and saving a bit from what Torvald gives her. “Whenever Torvald has given me money for new dresses and such things I have never spent more than half of it; I have always bought the simplest and cheapest things.”(13) Without trust, honesty can never be obtained. There was poor communication throughout their entire marriage and only at the end, after eight years of being married d...
Nora is a dynamic character. When the play begins Nora is viewed and presented as a playful and carefree person. She seems to be more intent on shopping for frivolous things. But, as time goes on it becomes apparent that Nora actually has a certain amount of seriousness in her decisions and actions in dealing with the debt she incurred to save Torvald’s life. Nora’s openness in her friendship with Dr. Rank changes after he professes his affections toward her. Her restraint in dealing with him shows that Nora is a mature and intelligent woman. Nora shows courage, not seen previously, by manipulating her way around Krogstad and his threats to reveal her secret. After feeling betrayed by Torvald, Nora reveals that she is leaving him. Having
...t to blackmail to bring about his desires. However, when one learns more about Krogstad, one sees that he is desperately trying to prove himself to his society in order that he may support his children. Krogstad became a social outcast because society was unforgiving. It could not forgive Krogstad for committing a crime for a greater good. Krogstad becomes redeemed by love and learns to forgive. He forgives Christine for forsaking him; he also forgives Nora of her debt. While Torvald is ungrateful of his wife’s love, Krogstad appreciates the new life given to him and is resolved to reform his life. Furthermore, Krogstad serves as the catalyst which prompts the process of Nora’s maturation. In the process, he has also changed into becoming a kinder man. By the end of the play, the future looks bright and promising for Krogstad as he begins a new life with Christine.
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” gives the reader a firsthand view at how gender roles affected the characters actions and interactions throughout the play. The play helps to portray the different struggles women faced during the 19th century with gender roles, and how the roles affected their relationships with men as well as society. It also helps to show the luxury of being a male during this time and how their higher status socially over women affected their relationships with women and others during this time period. Torvald Helmer starts off the story with a new job as a bank manager. He has a wife, Nora, who does not have a job in the workforce since that was the man's role.
In A Doll’s House, which ‘opened the door to a whole new world for women2’, Nora Helmer, wife to Torvald Helmer, is treated insignificantly by her husband. This is in relation to the title of the play. A doll is not a human being; it becomes what its owner makes of it. It does not have a role to play in public life. In the final act of the play, Nora certainly disputes this, by saying in the final act that ‘before everything else I’m a human being.’
A Doll’s House illustrates two types of women. Christine is without a husband and independent at the start of the play whereas Nora is married to Torvald and dependent on him and his position at the bank. Both begin at different ends of the spectrum. In the course of the play their paths cross and by the end of the play each woman is where the other started. It appears that a woman has two choices in society; to be married and dependent on a man or unmarried and struggle in the world because she does not have a man.
She starts to play more attention to Torvald after Krogstad threatens to tell her secret. Nora realizes that Torvald only sees her as a child that needs his help with everything she does. As she said,” I have existed merely to perform tricks for you, Torvald. But you would have it so” (720). She comes to understand that she was merely a doll to him, and that’s all he’s ever going to want her to be. Once Krogstad reveals the secret she decides to leave Torvald when he fails to prove that he truly loves her. As she said, “when the wonderful thing did not happen; then I saw you were not the man I had thought you” (722). She wanted him to show her that he would protect her and instead he got furious at her.
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.
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.
During the time in which Henrik Isben's play, A Doll?s House, 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. Nora is portrayed as a doll throughout the play until she realizes the truth about the world she lives in, and cuts herself free.