The Dilemmas Of Women In A Doll's House

Picture this: one day, you are walking down the street early in the evening. You see a sweet, elderly woman walking towards you on the opposite side of the sidewalk, carrying grocery bags in one hand and her purse in the other. She looks over-encumbered, but still when she sees you she smiles cheerfully and continues walking in your direction. But suddenly, a man dressed in black from head to toe runs past you and snatches the old woman’s purse right from her hands, and in her surprise she drops her groceries all over the ground. Now it’s decision time; would you just keep walking and pretend that nothing happened, or would you chase that thief and wrestle the purse from his hands to restore justice? Well regardless of your decision, it’s safe

Nora is the driving force of Ibsen’s examination of the role of women. She is a stereotypical housewife and mother who takes care of the house and children, and is put on display like a trophy by her husband Torvald. For example, Torvald puts his wife on grand display when he makes her dance the tarantella at the Christmas party so that everyone can see what a beautiful trophy wife he has. This further enforces the fact that to him, Nora is simply a pretty doll and holds a position of relative unimportance to Torvald. According to Nora, she is simply the, “Doll child” of her father and of her husband. Moreover, the entirety of Torvald and Nora’s marriage is largely a sham. At the end of A Doll House, they sit down together and Nora explains how their marriage is essentially a societal front. Even during their conversation, Torvald continues to treat Nora with disrespect, saying, “Oh, you think and talk like a silly child,” (941). She points out that they have never sat down and had an actual conversation about anything, and that they hold very different opinions on many things. Society dictates that a wife should never leave her husband and children; this would be considered abandonment of one’s “most sacred vows,” (939). However, Nora disagrees. She believes that her most sacred duties are to herself as a human

Ibsen shows just how much these two principals can ruin a person’s life and that society should discontinue the glorification of these ideas. Nora struggles against Torvald for power in their marriage. She uses deceit and manipulation to get what she wants from him since she has no real power of her own. However, Torvald has a great deal of control over Nora’s actions and even her opinions. On page 938, Nora points out that when she lived with her father, “He told [her] all his opinions, so [she] had the same ones… then [she] went from [her father’s] hands to Torvald’s. [He] arranged everything to [his] own taste.” The Helmers struggled for power over each other, and their friend Dr. Rank also experienced a power struggle of his own. Throughout the play, Rank fights against inevitable death. He inherited a disease from his father and has presumably battled the disease his entire life. When he finally deteriorates to his final stage of sickness, he loses the battle and disappears to die. But in addition to power and control, money is also a great motivating factor for the characters in the story. Nora was forced into debt when she borrowed money to cure Torvald of his health condition. She continued making payments on this debt without telling her husband, and the blackmailing from Krogstad as a result of this financial secret almost pushed her to commit suicide. Krogstad had financial