Analysis Of Henrik Ibsen 's ' A Doll 's House '

Ibsen uses creative, but effective, animal imagery to develop Nora's character throughout the play. He has Torvald call his wife "his little lark"(Isben) or "sulky squirrel"(Isben) or other animal names throughout the play. He uses a lot of 'bird' imagery-calling her many different bird names. The name Torvald uses directly relates to how he feels about her at the time. The animals Ibsen chooses to use are related to how Nora is acting, or how she needs to be portrayed.

In “A Doll House” Ibsen uses his male character, Torvald to be controlling towards his wife Nora, which lacks understanding in the play. This allows the plot development in the play to develop between the couple and shows the problem they face. This play allows me to compare Torvald and Nora to the american man and the girl in “Hills Like White Elephants.” The short story and the play are similar to each other because of the way the couples acts in both, they lack their communication skills, the males try to control the females and they lack understanding.

In Henrik Ibsen’s play A Doll’s House, pointedly captures the reality of the Victorian Era within the play. Nora Helmer, the protagonist of the story, represents the typical women in society during that era. The audience’s first impression of Nora is a money obsessed, childish, obedient house wife to her husband, Torvald Helmer. However, as the play progresses one can see that Nora is far from being that typical ideal trophy wife, she is an impulsive liar who goes against society’s norm to be whom and what she wants. Her husband is illustrated as the stereotypical man during the 19th century, as he is the dominate breadwinner of the family, who too deserts his position as the play reaches its end. A key theme that is brought to light in A

In portraying women as objects to be owned, Glaspell uses the bird cage and the dead bird, while Ibsen uses the dollhouse. Glaspell proves this point in Trifles, when Mrs. Hale declares that “It never seemed a very cheerful place” (Glaspell 918). Essentially, what this says is that Mrs. Wright was living in an environment where she was imprisoned –caged like a bird –by her husband and he tried to make her identity an extension of his own. Subsequently, Mrs. Hale says, “. . . she used to wear pretty clothes and be lively, when she was Minnie Foster,” which implies that all the life was strangled out of her after marriage (Glaspell 920). Similarly, A Dollhouse illustrates ownership when Torvald says, “Is my little squirrel bursting about” (Ibsen 1205)? The reference to his wife as an animal is extremely condescending and indicates his power and authority over her. In response to her husband, Nora acts childishly and therefore, he continues to treat her like a childish woman, to dominate. Here, Nora proclaims to her husband, “I mean that I was simply transferred from papa’s hands into yours” (Ibsen 1247).Torvald treats his wife as if she is a doll to be owned, which in the end causes Nora to realize that she is entrapped within the walls of her own dollhouse.

Henrik Ibsen’s “A Doll’s House” is a controversial play focusing on the marriage of Nora and Torvald Helmer. The play is filled with symbols that represent abstract ideas and concepts. These symbols effectively illustrate the inner conflicts that are going on between the characters. Henrik Ibsen’s use of symbolism such as the Christmas tree, the locked mailbox, the Tarantella, Dr. Rank’s calling cards, and the letters allows him to give a powerful portrayal to symbolize aspects of characters and their relationship to each other.

Henrik Ibsen’s “A Doll’s House” a nineteenth century play successfully uses symbolism to express many characteristics of Helmer’s life, together with the way that the main character Nora feels towards her marriage at the end of the play. Ibsen’s use of symbolism to convey about the social setting, including the harsh male-controlled Danish society, seen mostly in Torvald in the play and the role of women, signified mostly in Nora. These symbols act as foretelling before the tragic events at the end of the play, as they show the problems which lead to the demise of the Helmer’s ‘perfect’ family life.

   In his play, A Doll's House, Henrik Ibsen depicts a female protagonist, Nora Helmer, who dares to defy her husband and forsake her "duty" as a wife and mother to seek out her individuality. A Doll's House challenges the patriarchal view held by most people at the time that a woman's place was in the home. Many women could relate to Nora's situation. Like Nora, they felt trapped by their husbands and their fathers; however, they believed that the rules of society prevented them from stepping out of the shadows of men. Through this play, Ibsen stresses the importance of women's individuality. A Doll's House combines realistic characters, fascinating imagery, explicit stage directions, and

Ibsen utilizes the boundaries of the “inexpensively furnished” (147) room to create Nora’s symbolic cage displaying how she is physically unable to leave the confines of the room and the role in which every 19th century wife must play. In Act I, Nora plays her façade of the frivolous “funny little spendthrift” (150) in an effort to seem as defenseless as the woodland creatures Torvald finds so endearing and subsequently patronizing. Nora’s quarantine is enhanced as she is called a “squirrel…skylark, and little bird” (150) by Torvald, infantilizing her character and consequently solidifying her inability to escape the confines of her assumed womanly role. Nora readily assumes the position of a subordinate and feeble woman to protect the illusion she perceives as a complete home in addition to avoid “[being] completely alone” (154). This absolute isolation in adherence to the role in which she has been nurtured to conform to is slowly deteriorating her character, which is displayed in the increased sporadic nature of “poor little Nora’s” (152) actions and her lack of ability to focus as the play progresses. Nora’s childlike behaviors steadily become more obvious as her fixated birdcage becomes increasingly suffocating, the discomfort with her current isolation grows and as her mask of perfection slowly disintegrates.

In the play “A Doll’s House” Henrik Ibsen introduces us to Nora Helmer and shows us how spontanesly her design of the ideal life can change when a secret of her is revealed. Nora’s husbands promotion to Manager of the town Bank, leaves her convince she will be living a wonderful life; stress and worry free. However, Nora’s idea of a wonderful life is completely changed when her long-kept secret is revealed.

In the play, A Doll House, by Henrik Ibsen, Torvald Helmer is a misogynist who belittles his wife, Nora Helmer, but in reality, does this to live up to the masculine expectations that society places on him. Throughout the play, Torvald constantly belittles Nora. He often refers to his wife as “his little skylark” and “little featherhead”. On the first page of the story he says, “Is that my little squirrel rummaging around?”.

The relationship between Torvald and Nora is based on the assumption that women are beneath men. Torvald treats Nora like a girl would treat a doll. Torvald refers to Nora as his "lark," "squirrel," and his beautiful "songbird" throughout Ibsen's play, except when he is angry; then she becomes a woman. Elaine Baruch adds insight:

What comes to mind when the word morals is said? Whose morals should be followed, individual or group? In A Doll House, Ibsen portrays the protagonist, Nora, to follow the morals of her husband, Torvald. Four key aspects that help Nora decide to change her mind and make a decision to leave Torvald. These include the constant change of nicknames, the questioning of her own independence, the questioning of Torvald's love, and the realization that Torvald loves his reputation more then herself. As a result, Nora sets out to find her own individuality and moral beliefs.

In the play A Doll House, Henrik Ibsen uses symbols, motifs, and the setting to portray Nora’s subservience towards Torvald and Trovald’s patronizing attitude towards Nora. Ibsen utilities a motif of name-calling to display Torvald and Nora’s relationship. Torvald is frequently name-calling his wife using animal names. In fact, the very first sentence Torvald proclaims in the play is, “Is that my little lark twittering around there” to emphasize his authority over his wife (1667).

Surname 1Professor’s Name Student’s NameCourseDate A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen Henrik Ibsen a renowned play writer is applauded for his work; A Doll’s House whichstormed the theatre in the 19th century. Its setting revolves around the town environment in Norway. Throughout this play, there is a highlight of the societal misconceptions about gender discrimination as evident in how Torvald treats his wife. In the end of the play, there isan awakening of the senses of a woman who now refuses to stay oppressed as seen in Nora. Therefore in this discussion, we are going to discuss the characters of Torvald and his traits asportrayed in the play A Doll’s House. In the course of the analysis of his characteristics, we are going to classify both the negative and the positive traits. The discussion is going to focuson how the play writer intends to portray Torvald in the play.In the play, Torvald is the husband to Norah. Some of his traits come out evidently with the positions he holds in the house as the husband. In the play, Torvald is seen to be so proud of his new position at the bank. The love of authority makes Torvald leave his job at the government's Bureau because he sees no possibility of advancement. For this kind of trait,Norah who is his wife suffers from this. She is looked down upon and called with a number of names, but each starts with the word "little" such as “my little skylark”, “my little sweet-tooth”, “my poor little Nora”, “my pretty little pet” and also

In the Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll's House, there are several symbols used to help the reader better understand the relationship between Nora and Torvald Hemler. In the beginning of the play, Torvald calls Nora his “little squirrel” as she walks in the room (Ibsen 1). Although it seems that Torvald is innocently teasing his wife out of endearment, Ibsen is actually developing a much deeper meaning. When one looks at a squirrel’s life, it spends most of its time finding nuts and hiding it locations so that other animals do not find it. In the same way, Nora secretly purchases and hides her macaroons in hopes of hiding