Critical Analysis of a Doll House

Henrik Ibsen uses several different stylistic devices in A Doll’s House. The author’s choice of writing this piece as a play is to emphasize interactions between various

Ibsen 's play A Doll 's House centers on a stereotypical and comfortable family in the nineteenth century which, outwardly, has the appearance of respectability to which any audience can relate. There are many indicators that reveal that this family upholds a false image, such as the symbolic title “A Doll 's House". Nora is introduced as a "little Spendthrift" (p 6), which foreshadows future tension in her relationship. Torvald believes she is spending money frivolously, but she has actually secretly borrowed money to save his life, and is using the money he gives her to pay back her debt.

A Doll 's House by Henrik Ibsen, is a play that has been written to withstand all time. In this play Ibsen highlights the importance of women’s rights. During the time period of the play these rights were neglected. Ibsen depicts the role of the woman was to stay at home, raise the children and attend to her husband during the 19th century. Nora is the woman in A Doll House who plays is portrayed as a victim. Michael Meyers said of Henrik Ibsen 's plays: "The common denominator in many of Ibsen 's dramas is his interest in individuals struggling for and authentic identity in the face of social conventions. This conflict often results in his characters ' being divided between a sense of duty to themselves and their responsibility to others." All of the aspects of this quote can be applied to the play A Doll House, in Nora Helmer 's character, who throughout much of the play is oppressed, presents an inauthentic identity to the audience and throughout the play attempts to discovery her authentic identity.

While A Doll House and Machinal arose from very different time periods and theatrical movements, they both tell similar stories and touch upon similar social issues. The common theme between them is the idea of freedom of the individual (specifically women) from society.

A Doll’s House, by Henrik Ibsen, portrays a young married woman, Nora, who plays a dramatic role of deception and self-indulgence. The author creates a good understanding of a woman’s role by assuming Nora is an average housewife who does not work; her only job is to maintain the house and raise the children like a stereotypical woman that cannot work or help society. In reality, she is not an average housewife in that she has a hired maid who deals with the house and children. Although Ibsen focuses on these “housewife” attributes, Nora’s character is ambitious, naive, and somewhat cunning. She hides a dark secret from her husband that not only includes borrowing money, but also forgery. Nora’s choices were irrational; she handled the

   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.

Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House conveys the story of a wife’s struggle to break away from the social norms of late nineteenth century middle class Europe. Throughout the play, Ibsen focuses on Nora’s characterization and experiences and thus this leads the reader to perceive her as the protagonist. On the other hand, her husband, Helmer – also referred to as Torvald, is revealed as the antagonist as the dialogue between him and Nora throughout the entire play portrays him as an authoritative figure and oppressor rather than a

Simon Stephens’ modern adaption of the 1879 play by Henrik Ibsin, A Doll’s House, has allowed for audiences to experience the intense play in modern times. With Carrie Cracknell’s effective use of realism conventions and elements of drama, she has successfully displayed themes of deception to the audience. The play follows the story of Nora Helmer, and all the interactions between 6 other characters that follow while she maintains a major secret from her husband Torvald. The director demonstrates combined use of elements of drama along with realism conventions to effectively portray the themes of betrayal such as roles and relationships, use of the fourth wall, and personal objects. Her effective use of these conventions has led to a brilliant adaption of the classic play A Doll’s House.

Furthermore, Ibsen uses the conversation between Nora and Krogstad to illuminate the theme of deceit. Deceit is the central theme of the play with the spiral of devious events undertaken by Nora becoming at catalyst for her awakening. The theme is prominently illuminated during the first conversation between Nora and Krogstad with it being revealed Krogstad lent Nora the money she sought to save Torvalds life, ‘you came to me to borrow two hundred and fifty pounds.’ This heightens the climax as the reveal of Nora’s loan juxtaposes Torvalds negative values on borrowing money, ‘No debts! Never borrow! A home that is founded on debts and borrowing can never be a place of freedom and beauty.’ However, even though Nora disobeyed Torvalds central rule of borrowing money, her act of deceit was committed for ‘moral’ reasons as she had to save his life provoking the audience to

Henrik Ibsen's cleverly uses setting within A Doll's House in order to make his work one which aptly describes both the time period and societal constraints in which the Helmers, particularly Nora, reside. Women of the time were frequently frowned upon for any attempts to move out of the social stereotype of silent-as-mice housewives. Nora however, finally chose to break that boundary in deciding to leave her husband and children, leaving them vulnerable to ridicule and open criticism of Nora's self-absorption. As well, in Norway, women were not permitted to control their own money until 1888, following A Doll's House's performance and publication by almost a decade. Thus, Nora's actions in the play were illegal at the time and considered extremely scandalous. Kristine Linde represents the seemingly average woman of the time, choosing a life that centers around not only helping, but taking care of others, essentially acting as a mother to everyone she knows. Ibsen's writing was particularly influential to the time period, in which women's rights movements were beginning construction and obtaining followers. However, although A Doll's House is today interpreted as a feminist play, Ibsen was less concerned with the rights of one particular group than the rights of humankind. Perhaps it was because of his self-imposed exile after the failure of his theatre in which Ibsen felt the need for all humans to be

In “A Doll House” by Henrik Ibsen was created during 1800s time period. This play helps shine a light on the gender roles of the 1800s while also creating a twist that was uncommon for this period. During this time period, women were left home to oversee the domestic duties, while men went to commuted to work (Hughes). Men were seen as physically superior but morally inferior to women; which is also portrayed within this book (Hughes). This play marks the beginning of Henrik Ibsen’s realist period, which he explored the ordinary lives of small-town people (Kirszner and Mandell 881). This “modern tragedy” helped make Ibsen famous internationally because of the real-life story it captured (Kirszner and Mandell 882). Henrik Ibsen uses an array of literary devices to help keep the reader captivated from beginning to end. Three of the most prominent literary devices used by Henrik Ibsen are symbolism, foreshadowing, and an array of themes. These literary devices help transform a basic play into a complex story of lies and deception.

Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House was a controversial play for its time because it questioned society's basic rules and norms. Multiple interpretations can be applied to the drama, which allows the reader to appreciate many different aspects of the play. This paper examines how both Feminist and Marxist analyses can be applied as literary theories in discussing Ibsen's play because both center on two important subject matters in the literary work: the roles of women in a male-dominated society, and, the power that money has over people.

Ibsen also employs the use of many smaller themes within his play, A Doll House. Respect and reputation, love, lies and deceit, and money are just a few of these smaller themes. Respect and reputation are something that the men of this play are obsessed with. Some of the men have good standing in society and would do anything to keep it. While other men have lost their good name and would go to great lengths to get it back. Even though the play is set in a private home, the reader knows that the public eye is constantly peeking in. Another important theme that Ibsen puts in to this play is love. He uses the

A Doll’s House was published in Norway in 1879 by Henrik Isben. He is known as the father of Modern Theatre. He is also referred as the father of realism. The play is very interesting because of the funny dialogue, the unique characters, and Ibsen 's view of the place of ladies in the public eye. The main characters of the play is Nora Helmer and her husband Torvald Helmer. Imagine what it would be like to live in a doll 's home? It 's a house in which you are controlled and have no energy to settle on any solid choice; It 's a house in which you are a play thing for another person 's amusement. This sounds a ton like an awful marriage, so it 's a house in which your husband holds the satchel strings, in a manner of speaking, and abandons you with no influence over your family 's accounts. In fact, your husband keeps you on a tightrope. Such is the perceived life of Nora Helmer.