Category: A Doll’s House

A Doll’s House is a famous play by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen in 1879. The core ideas of the play regard the issues of the bourgeoisie society of the late 19th century. A big role is given to the theme of women’s liberation and husband-wife relationships. These and many other important social issues have been displayed in A Doll’s House for a couple of centuries, and the staging of the play was changed many times. Read about A Doll’s House set design and costumes in this essay sample to learn more about how different productions re-interpreted the famous play.

A Doll’s House Review

One of the foremost characteristics of Henrik Ibsen’s play A Doll’s House is that its plot appears linearly defined, which, in turn, explains the semantic realism of play’s overall sounding. As it is the case with most of Ibsen’s other plays, throughout A Doll’s House, characters’ existential stances never cease undergoing a qualitative transformation. The way characters position themselves at play’s beginning is different from the way they position themselves at play’s end. As it will be shown in this essay, stage design and costumes in “A Doll’s House” influence the characters’ self-positioning and the way the conflict unfolds.

There are reasons to believe that the realism of this particular play reflects the actual workings of the author’s analytical mindset. Ibsen never ceased being aware of the fact that the extent of play’s realistic sounding demonstrates the degree of presented characters’ intellectual flexibility, extrapolated in the particulars of how they address life’s challenges.

As Kaufmann (1965) put it, “[Ibsen] knows that truth never is a possession, but a constant effort to find the appropriate response to every situation which demands a decision” (22). The legitimacy of such our hypothesis can be explored with the play’s synopsis.

A Doll’s House Summary

Nora Helmer is a married woman, who helped her husband Torvald Helmer (bank clerk) once by borrowing a large sum of money from the bank, after forged her dad’s signature. Torvald is entirely unaware of the forgery that had taken place. Initially, he is a loving husband, who affectionately treats Nora, even though he also appears to be utterly ignorant of Nora’s basic humanity – throughout the play, Torvald treats her as a pretty but soulless doll. Krogstad is another important character in “A Doll’s House”

When being faced with the prospect of losing his job in Torvald’s bank, he threatens to blackmail Nora (because of her forgery) if she does not convince Torvald to refrain from firing him. Eventually, Torvald finds out about Nora’s forgery and becomes enraged over his wife’s presumed infidelity.

In act 1 of “A Doll’s House”, he ends up accusing Nora of moral depravity while suggesting that under no circumstances should Nora have considered keeping secrets from him. Torvald’s behavior opens Nora’s eyes to the fact that she has been loyal to an unworthy man who was unable to address life’s challenges and for whom the continuous observation of social customs meant so much more than ensuring his wife’s happiness.

It begins to dawn upon Nora that her staying with Torvald may very well be compared to the stay of a bird in the cage. After having realized it, Nora decides to leave Torvald, who, in her eyes, has been downsized from a respectful head of the household to a regular moralistic hypocrite, unable to appreciate Nora in a way she truly deserved. Nora says good-bye to Torvald and her children and embarks upon the quest to find her lost sense of identity.

Play Production

The earlier provided outline of the plot points out what can be considered the first indication of the play’s dramaturgic uniqueness – the sharply defined dramatics sounding of its themes and motifs. Therefore, it comes as not a particular surprise that the action in A Doll’s House appears spatially limited. As was pointed out by Jakovljevic (2002): “Ibsen’s family drama [A Doll’s House] is set within the space of perspectival constraints.

The entire play takes place in this single set that represents the living room in a middle-class family flat” (432). What it means is that, while staging A Doll’s House, directors must focus their attention on ensuring the psychological plausibility of themes and motifs, contained in this particular play, as their principal priority. The best way to accomplish this is by exposing the essence of psychological anxieties experienced by the play’s characters, as such that relate to the worries on the part of the audience’s members.

Within the context of Ibsen play’s staging, ensuring action’s psychological plausibility will not represent much of a challenge.

The reason for this is simple – unlike what it is commonly assumed, A Doll’s House is not solely concerned with exploring the theme of women’s liberation from patriarchal oppression. It also exposes what accounts for the existentialist incompatibility between husband and wife – subject matter that even today remains utterly relevant.

As noted by Haugen (1979): “Ibsen’s Nora is not just a woman arguing for female liberation; she is much more.

She embodies the comedy as well as the tragedy of modern life” (vii). In other words, there is a clear rationale for a modernist staging of A Doll’s House, as it would emphasize the play’s contemporary themes and motifs. One way of ensuring the conceptual relevance of Ibsen’s play for a modern audience is to stage an unconventional production. The following is how four elements of theatre (set, costumes, characterization, and audience participation) can reflect a modernist staging of A Doll’s House.

A Doll’s House Stage Design & Foregrounding

A Doll’s House does not leave the boundaries of one single room. That eases up the process of designing the set. Given the minimalistic traditions of the modernist theatre, a table and several chairs on the foregrounding of “A Doll’s House” would be more than adequate.

The importance of an onstage environment, as an additional instrument of ensuring action’s plausibility, is lessened. That’s because, after all, “A Doll’s House” is a kind of play that can be called primarily verbal. One can see this from the below quote: “In a word, A Doll’s House is a play about writing. It is a play about writing with consequences, about words that act and generate action” (Jakovljevic 433).

Nevertheless, to make unraveling of the plot more authenticated, the trappings of a middle-class home may be utilized as well. By simplifying onstage set to a minimum, the director will be able to “kill two rabbits with one shot”: to modernize the play’s action in the eyes of the audience, and to emphasize the sheer extent of play action drama.

A Doll’s House Costume Design

The dramaturgic value of A Doll’s House is Ibsen’s ability to expose characters’ psychological anxieties, rather than his talent in authenticating the realities of 19th century’s Norwegian living. Therefore, modern production should dress actors in contemporary or ‘minimalist’ costumes.

It will provide an additional stimulus for the audience to focus on play’s themes and motifs if Torvald, Krogstad, and Dr. Rank wear black trousers and black golf sweaters. Nora and Mrs. Linde can wear black shirts and matching tight skirts. In its turn, this costume symbolism will substantially increase the extent of production’s intellectual appeal.

The suggestion, in this respect, correlates with the point, made in Cima’s (1983) article: “The director might choose to present A Doll’s House so that the action is ‘to discover oneself’ (a ‘feminist’ approach), or he might focus on the action ‘to play the game” (15). By having actors dressed in minimalist costumes, the director will prompt them to be more focused on ‘playing the game,’ as opposed to being concerned with maintaining the spirit of historicity.

The utilization of ‘minimalist’ costumes in “A Doll’s House” is the pathway towards ensuring production’s modernist sounding.

Main Characters of the Play

As mentioned earlier, with the possible exception of Torvald, the characters in Ibsen’s play are in the state of undergoing a constant intellectual transition. For example, the way how Nora reacts to life’s challenges in Act One is qualitatively different from the way she responds to these challenges in Act Three.

It means that, while striving to ensure the genuineness of actors’ onstage performance, the director will have to look into creating objective preconditions for actors’ interaction to serve the purpose of revealing developmental aspects of played characters’ psychological makeup: “With the advent of Ibsen’s plays… a revised category of gestures became necessary: the autistic gesture, or subtle visual sign of the character’s soliloquy with himself” (Cima 22).

That can be achieved with the means of encouraging actors to perform in a mostly spontaneous manner while going as far as even indulging in verbal interaction with the audience if thought contextually appropriate.

A Doll’s House Modernist Staging – Audience Participation

The success of using a modernist approach to theatrical productions depends on turning viewers into active participants, often despite their desire to remain passive. Encouraging actors to improvise thought-provoking remarks, even if these remarks have nothing to do with play’s actual script, can do this.

In A Doll’s House modernist staging, actors needed to expose parallels between Torvald’s behavioral superficiality and that of many of today’s effeminate men. The latter, despite their willingness to ‘act responsibly,’ exhibit several psychological weaknesses in their daily lives.

For example, while coming up with his moralistic speeches, Torvald may very well refer to political correctness, as the source of conventional morality, which will undoubtedly trigger strong emotional reactions in the audience.

Conclusion

The legitimacy of an earlier outlined production proposal can be explored concerning Gardner’s online article, where she elaborates on the particulars of Erica Whyman’s staging of A Doll’s House. According to Gardner (2008), Whyman had made the deliberate point in representing the play’s plot as unraveled in the fifties. “The 1950s setting works very well; it is a period far enough away in time for the stifling social code of Ibsen’s play not to jar, but modern enough to connect with today” (Guardian).

Moreover, judging from Gardner’s point of view, Whyman considered it entirely appropriate, altering the semantic subtleties of play’s characterization. “Well-meaning but misguided Torvald is no villain; indeed, initially it is the beautiful Nora – a self-conscious spoiled child – who is the least appealing of the protagonists” (Guardian).

Whyman had no reservations about modernizing the, which contributed immensely to production’s success with the audience. How Whyman had gone about staging Ibsen’s play points out to the fact that it would indeed be appropriate, on the director’s part, to utilize the modernist approach to the clothes symbolism and stage design of A Doll’s House – just as it was initially hypothesized in the paper.

References

Cima, Gibson Gay “Discovering Signs: The Emergence of the Critical Actor in Ibsen.” Theatre Journal 35.1 (1983): 5-22. Print.

DiYanni, Robert. Literature: Approaches to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. 2^nd edition. New York: McGraw-Hill Humanities. Print.

Gardner, Lyn “A Doll’s House.”. 2008. Guardian. Web.

Haugen, Einar. Ibsen’s Drama: Author to Audience. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1979. Print.

Jakovljevic, Branislav “Shattered Back Wall: Performative Utterance of A Doll’s House.” Theatre Journal 54.3 (2002): 431-448. Print.

Kaufmann, F.W. “Ibsen’s Conception of Truth.”Ibsen: A Collection of Critical Essays. Ed. Rolf Fjelde. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall. 1965. 17-30. Print.

Appendices

Erica Whyman’s fifties-styled production of A Doll’s House.

At a glance, Ibsen’s Doll’s House recounts a story about the place of women in society, as well as marriage stereotypes and norms accepted in the 19^th century. Further considerations of the text connotations, setting, characters description, and symbolism reveal the contrary beliefs.

Certainly, the story focuses on the relationships between males and females and underlines the role of hierarchy, but these aspects fall into the background, since the central focus is made on the problem of deceitful appearances and concept of humanity.

The main heroine, Nora Helmer is compared to a doll who is manipulated by all other characters, including her husband, dearest friends, and relatives. However, this pressure is not tolerable for human because each person has the right to self-expression and individualism.

In this respect, Ibsen underscores the right of humans to freedom and independence from other decisions irrespective of gender affiliation, social positions, and accepted beliefs. All these aspects are explicitly revealed through describing setting, character development, and symbolism depicted in the play.

In the play, the author creates the unity of setting so as to underscore the feeling that the main heroine Nora is the prisoner of her life. Thus, the setting for action remains the same throughout the play which frames the environment in a simple and conventional fashion.

At the same time, the setting contributes to a sense of limits imposed by society and surrounding people, whereas its conventionality reveals the emphasis placed on respectability and image. While describing the setting, the author applies such words as “comfortably and tastefully” (Ibsen 7).

Most importantly, the description of the Helmers’ apartment provides a standard vision of a 19^th century house where all requisites of traditional life are present. Aside from place characteristics embracing stereotypical visions of the house, there are typical time characteristics uncovering the norms and standards of social standards.

Hence, the play represents within a short period of time, which also imposes certain limits on characters’ actions and development. Importantly, while describing the setting Ibsen applies to the parallel situations to highlight the central predicament of the main heroine.

Judging from the description of furnishing and design, it is possible to judge about conventions of furniture layout, which corresponds to the accepted traditions. Once again, the setting provides the frames and restrictions enhancing the established conventions and norms within society.

Just like the standard design of an apartment, the main heroine takes the standard place of a model wife and hostess in the house, as it was required by the societal norms. At the beginning of the play, Nora enjoys her role of bourgeois wife and encourages her husband giving her different pet names.

She seems reluctant to understand the reality and follows the rules established by the surrounding people, including her husband, Torvald, her friend Christina, lawyer’s Krogstag, and Dr. Rank. By taking different roles imposed by others, Nora forgets about herself as a personality with personal wishes, goals, and desires.

Her husband gives her different names that are usually given to animals or inanimate objects, such as “my little skylark”, “my squirrel”, “my little lark” “little Nora” (Ibsen 11, 13). By adding the epithet “little” to names, Torvald as if neglects Nora’s personality and rejects her right to choose and decide.

However, further development of the play reveals Nora’s self-evaluation and apprehension of husband’s real intents and goals. She becomes more aware of the reality and of what is going outside the apartment.

Hence, while reading the final conversation between Nora and her husband, it is possible to trace the changes occurred to the heroine in terms of her attitude to marriage and relations.

She suddenly realizes that the house she lives in “…has never been anything but a playroom” and that she has never “…exchanged a serious word on a serious subject” (Ibsen 99). At the end, the discussion of her position and role reveals an intelligence that has made her understand the uncomfortable reality of restricted moral and ethical codes that are represented by Torvald.

The play contains elements of symbolism proving Nora’s insignificant position with regard to other people manipulating her. The author draws the parallels between the heroine and the Christmas tree, that is a beautiful addition to the overall decoration of the house; at the same, it is considered as useless thing, merely an element of traditional design.

While analyzing author’s descriptions of the tree, one can find similar traits in Nora’s character: “the Christmas is….stripped of its ornaments and with burnt-down candle-ends on its disheveled branches” (Ibsen 49). Once again, the author compares the main heroine with inanimate object serving as an additional elements in the apartment interior.

In conclusion, the author provides criticism of social order in the 19^th century, when society imposed social and moral restriction on people and limited their human rights.

Nora, the main heroine, is the victim of the settled stereotypes about marriage norms and relations between a wife and a husband. By following these norms, she loses the sense of identity and forgets about her right to be an independent personality.

Works Cited

Ibsen, Henric. A Doll’s House. US: Arc Manor LLC. 2009. Print.

Henrik Ibsen’s play A Doll’s House was published in 1879, and it provoked intense reactions of the public because of its controversial theme based on the idea of gender inequality in the context of the nineteenth century. Ibsen’s approach to discussing social issues and presenting them in the form of plays written as prose became one of the key features of modern drama. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the prominent elements of fiction used in A Doll’s House as the most vivid example of Ibsen’s approach, analyze the applied dramatic techniques, and describe different layers of understanding related to the play.

Elements of Fiction

The key elements of fiction are usually related to the author’s development of a plot, characters, a point of view, a setting, a theme, and a style. In A Doll’s House, Ibsen develops a plot that has a climax near the end of the play based on such techniques as foreshadowing and conflicts. The dramatic tension in the plot is created by foreshadowing observed in dialogues to help the audience predict the future development of actions. The overall plot is built on Nora’s secret, and Torvald’s possible reactions to this concealed information can be predicted. In Act I, he says, “Keep your little Christmas secrets to yourself, my darling. They will all be revealed tonight when the Christmas Tree is lit, no doubt” (Ibsen 22). The plot is also based on conflicts between Nora and Torvald and Nora and Krogstad, which are external, and they develop in all three acts of the play. Nora’s internal conflict regarding her decision to reveal her secret to Torvald can also be observed throughout the whole play.

It is also important to pay attention to the characterization used by Ibsen to present Nora as a dynamic character in contrast to Torvald as a static character. In Act I, Nora is represented as a woman who is cheerful and living in her fantasy world of a happy marriage (Ibsen 12). In this reality, Nora commits a crime to help her husband, but she is viewed as a doll, as a “little squirrel,” and a “little singing-bird,” but not as a woman with her own opinion (Ibsen 14-26). Still, in Act III, Nora’s character is demonstrated as changing in contrast to uncompromising Torvald, and she becomes more decisive.

The author also paid much attention to developing the theme of the play concerning symbols and motifs. Nora’s transformation is represented by the symbol of a doll and the motif of a masquerade in Act II. Changing clothes for the masquerade is used to accentuate Nora’s suppressed identity and the necessity of concealing not only her secret but also her desires. Therefore, while seeing masquerade clothes, Nora wants to “rip them in a million pieces!” not to pretend anymore (Ibsen 84). However, Nora still assumes another identity during the masquerade, and her dance represents her fear, panic, dissatisfaction, and frustration (Ibsen 86). Other important symbols that are used to develop the theme of a woman’s position in a family and society are a dollhouse and a Christmas tree.

Dramatic Techniques

In this play, such dramatic techniques as entrances and exits play an important role because they help develop the plot. The entrances of Christine Linde and Krogstad in Act I accentuate Nora’s attitudes to these people and her inner fears and emotions. What is more important is that the exit of Nora in Act III emphasizes her parting with her past. In this context, much attention is paid to using sounds in addition to music and lighting. When Nora decides to leave Torvald, she slams the door putting an end to her marriage (Ibsen 114). In Act II, music is used to support tarantella and accentuate all emotions Nora has and needs to cope with. In addition, Ibsen also uses the soliloquy in Act I of the play to demonstrate all these feelings that cause Nora’s unrest, which will later lead to her performance of tarantella and decision to leave her home.

Layers of Understanding

All the discussed elements can also be analyzed concerning different layers of understanding used by Ibsen for developing his play. At the narrative layer, Ibsen provides the message about a submissive role of a woman in a family in the context of the first feminist ideas spread in Europe. The aesthetic layer in Ibsen’s play is represented by discussing the topic that was not previously described in plays in Norway. Therefore, the play had an enormous effect on the public. At the mechanical layer, A Doll’s House takes a form of a play written in prose that supports the innovativeness of the presented idea by the use of symbols, imagery, and language. From this perspective, at the dynamic layer, Ibsen develops the tension in his play accentuating external and internal conflicts of the characters and provokes the audience’s emotions while proposing the end that was unexpected in the context of the nineteenth century. At the connections layer, Ibsen links the play to his previous works and other authors’ works accentuating its traditional structure that has an unusual development and ending.

Conclusion

Ibsen’s A Doll’s House has become a vivid example of modern drama. The play has drawn the public’s attention to the problem of a woman’s role in society. The unique effect on the audience became a result of using certain elements of fiction and applying efficient dramatic techniques. As a result, this play can be analyzed concerning five layers of understanding that contribute to its interpretation.

Work Cited

Ibsen, Henrik. A Doll’s House. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2015.

Introductions

Written by Henrik Ibsen, A Doll’s House is a play released during the Victorian era of the 19^th century. The play addresses life as it was then, when women where no more than dolls, unable to perform significant roles in the then society as well as standing up for themselves in the family.

It addresses the issue of gender roles, showing how disempowered the female is and the consequences behind this. Nora, a major character and a wife to Helmer, illustrates how women suffer mistreatments and degradations from their husbands. Following the impact on the life styles of women and the devastation of gender roles in the then century, brought by Ibsen through this publication, which is also evident today, the composition stands out as a feminist essay right from the title, A Doll’s House, up to the end of the play.

Feminism in the Play

Feminism is an issue that pursues the liberation of women, majority of whom live as slaves even in their very own families, whether married or not. This is the condition of women as at the time when Ibsen composes the play. He is handling the situation as it is as a call for women to stand up and fight for their rights in the society.

The topic of the play serves as a clear illustration of feminism. A Doll is denotes the position of a woman in the family. A major character employed to portray is Nora. She is married to Helmer who refers to her as a mere doll rather than a wife. Nora is referred by her husband as a songbird, a lark, a squirrel, names that suggest how insignificant she is to her.

In fact, Helmer asks, “Didn’t you tell me no one had been here…My little songbird must never do that again. A songbird must have a clean beak to chirp with-no false notes!” (Ibsen 25). Helmer stands out as a commander in his family. Everything he tells his wife ought to be adhered to regardless of the consequences therein. The way he questions Nora depicts his sternness and authoritative position in his family. He deprives Nora of the ability to decide as the wife.

She cannot decide on whom to welcome in her family, neither can she decide on what to do in it. She only dances the tune of her husband. She is just a doll in the house that does in accordance with what others need out of it but not what it needs out of them. This degradation is what the writer brings forth to the women stressing on their need to rise up and fight against it.

Nora is given every sort of names by her husband. But this does not make her dump him. They are together as a husband and a wife for a good number of years.

Yes, Torvald, I can’t get along a bit without your help” (Ibsen 26). Money seems to be everything that Nora wants. But she realizes later that it (money) is useless without her enjoying her rights, not only as a woman but also a living being. In her reaction against the situation, she makes the best individual pronouncement for the first time. She opts for abandoning her husband to stay alone where she can enjoy freedom.

She will not be constrained in a house like a doll; neither will she dance to any other person’s tune, but hers. She is a feminist whom the play uses as an illustration that women can make sound decisions as well as playing a significant role in their families other than just cooking and taking care of their husbands.

“The common denominator in many of Ibsen’s dramas is his interest in individuals struggling for and authentic identity in the face of tyrannical social conventions. This conflict often results in his characters’ being divided between a sense of duty to themselves and their responsibility to others” (Ibsen 1563). Nora realizes that she is more than what she does or what his husband thinks she can do and has the right to manifest her talent or powers as a woman.

She goes for this right. In fact, she declares that she needs to “make sense of [her] self and everything around her” (Ibsen 25). This is her turning point. She is ready to stand up for her rights as a woman regardless of the prevailing situation where women are being oppressed and denied some of their fundamental rights like the right to make personal decisions.

Mrs. Linde’s conversation with Nora depicts her as one who led a life based on the decisions of her late husband. For instance, when her husband dies, she has virtually nothing of her own, money and children inclusive. This places everything in her then family in the hands of her husband. She has no power to earn as a woman. This is only the task of her husband. The death of her husband is symbolic. It implies the end of slavery and a commencement of feminism.

Linde sets off to look for a job, which in turn enables her to take care of her family. This is no more than the realization that she is capable of working for her people just like her husband. In fact, she stands out as woman enough to leave a note to her husband claiming to return the following day. This is contrary to what is expected of the then women. They ought to stay in the houses all the times as the title, ‘A Doll’s House’ suggests. In her dialogue with Krogstad, she says that she is now ‘free’ and wishes to look after her family.

This depicts the oppression she experiences before realizing that she is equally as powerful as a man and that she is all able to support her family. For instance, she takes a full responsibility of nursing her sick mother. This is not a possible case before when she is a doll in her husband’s house. She says that she was “a poor girl who’d been led astray” (Ibsen 29). This is the consequence of oppression that Ibsen addresses, that is in turn realized and abandoned by people like Linde and Nora-the feminists.

Nora initially is a ‘pet’ in her family. She is just there to make her husband happy by going out with him, cooking for him, and maintaining his title as a ‘man’ owing to her beauty. As a doll plays its assigned role, not based on the situation, Nora has to tolerate this torture for the sake of her husband.

This is her life that she realizes later that it is no more than a lie. She imagines of another one where she will be, not a doll, but a significant and a responsible person in her society. Nora says, “I’ve been your wife-doll here, just as at home I was Papa’s doll-child”(Ibsen 1608). This is the beginning of her realization. She is now courageous enough to confront her very own stern husband no matter the outcome.

She is ready to fight for her rights as a woman. “I have to try to educate myself. You can’t help me with that. I’ve got to do it alone. And that’s why I’m leaving you now” (Ibsen 1609). Nora goes for the change she wants. She can educate herself regardless of her being a woman. She is not afraid of saying this to her husband.

Conclusion

Ibsen finalizes the play by depicting all the women characters as feminists who abandon their ‘doll’ lives to leave like free, significant, and responsible in their societies. Nora, Linde, among others, begin as slaves but end a feminists. This renders Ibsen’s ‘A Doll’s House’ a feminist essay.

Works Cited

Ibsen, Henrik. “A Doll’s House” London: Nick Hern Books, 1994.

This paper will carry out a biographical analysis of the play titled A Doll’s House by Henrique Ibsen and will focus on the main character Norah Helmer and the role of the other characters in her life. These characters are Torvald Helmer, Dr. Rank, and Nils Krogstad. The paper will make various references to the play and will conclude by giving an overall analysis of the characters that have been profiled.

A Doll’s House revolves around a character called Norah Helmer who is the wife of Torvald Helmer and together they have three children. Norah is a complex person who builds her happy life through the adoption of the fantastic expectations of her husband which denies her the chance to reveal her authenticity. One of her popular comments in the play is “The children shouldn’t see this till dusk after it has been decorated” and this remark allows the reader to start understanding the nature of Norah Helmer. She allows her husband to have a perception that she is a down-to-earth, submissive and obedient wife and she entertains her husband through dance, recitations, and dress-ups. She uses her feminine charm to convince and influence her husband and pretends that she is submissive to his instructions. Later in the play, the reader learns that this is a childhood trait and she cannot allow her husband to feel obligated to her. She does anything she can to safeguard her illusions of a happy home.

Norah is a criminal and a hero at the same time (Unwin 19). She saves the life of her husband by obtaining a confidential loan after forging her father’s signature. This brings a legal issue that can explore the place of a married woman in the family. In this society where the play is set, women were not supposed to get loans without the permission of the man of the house. She tries to pay this huge loan using her meager resources for years and hides under the veneer of arts and crafts which she practices. Her readiness to defy the law to save Mr. Helmer’s health illustrates that she is a courageous woman and debunks the perception that she is a weak character.

She is not changed by Krogstad’s blackmail and the trauma that accompanies it and these challenges actually open her world to her potential which has not been fulfilled and appreciated. During the climactic encounter with her husband, she tells him “I have been doing tricks for you, Torvald” (McFarlane 34). This is when she realises that she has not been her authentic self all through her illusionary happy marriage. Norah has been faking identity so as to conform to the expectations of her husband and the society but she changes radically after being catalysed by the reaction of her husband after he learns about the loan obtained through forgery. She learns that her whole life is on a collision course with her real personality. She starts defying her husband in small but useful ways.she starts by feeding on the macaroons and cheating about it. She starts deriving pleasure from small acts of rebellion as her awareness about her true life continues to rise. This awareness escalates her need for rebellion and this leads to her ultimate departure from her house, leaving her children and husband in the house. She goes to search for the independence that has been lacking in her life. One of the most influential people in her life is Torvald Helmer and he is a man who has a very narrow view of what is good and bad. This man presents himself as the perfect patriarch of his household, a man who is firmly in control of his own family and a wise man with a high sense of moral judgement. His fortunes turn for the better when he assumes a managerial position in a savings bank and a better part of his conversations with his wife revolve around finances and money. These conversations reveal his patronising nature as he talks about how he avoids taking loans and being in debt. This reveals his cautious approach to life and is conscious of how the public perceives him. He talks to his wife using a condescending tone; one would think that he is a parent and not a spouse to Norah. The wife therefore fakes an impression that she is totally obedient to him is and he buys this false impression. Though he exudes a strong exterior, he is a coward who cannot confront simple issues like personal illness or illness of a close pal. All the people around him struggle to protect him from several realities of life and one of his biggest undoings is thinking that the world revolves around him. He thinks that his wife must be the person he expects her to be and manipulates her to do several things which she falsely submits to. Naturally, he is a misogynist who thinks that the problems in the worlds are caused by women. Though he portrays himself as strong man, he is actually weaker than the wife; he is more childish and has to be sheltered like a baby from the harsh realities of life. His childishness is petty and is revealed by his refusal to work with Krogstad because he is threatened by the fact that Krogstad does not respect him as he expects. “Retaining Krogstad will make me a laughing stock and I don’t want to suffer indignity in front of my juniors” (Ibsen 78). This is another petty decision he makes after his wife request that Krogstad be kept at the office and this indicates that his reputation is a priority that cannot be equated with the desires of his wife and the interests of others. His final reaction emphasises his egoistic nature where he insists that his wife has ruined his happiness and will not be allowed to be in control of the house and children. However he bars her from leaving the house because he does not want the society to notice that there is a split in the family. He wants to save the appearance of his family because cannot stand negative perception from the public.

Another person who really influences the life of Norah Helmer is Dr Rank. Dr Rank is a family friend of the Torvald’s and he visits them everyday on his way home from work. He is very close to Norah because unlike her husband, he listens to her without castigating and demonizing her. Norah confides in Dr Rank and feels comfortable in his presence. She also tries to flirt with him and his feelings for Torvald’s wife are deeper; their relationship is more than ordinary friendship. Dr Rank has a terminal disease and when he is about to die, she calls Norah because there is something she wants to share wit her. He does not allow Torvald to see him in his sick room saying “Torvald Helmer is too sensitive to face me in my situation and I can’t have him around”. Norah wants to ask him for money to pay off her loan but her conscience holds her back. She realises that she has been using her feminine charm on Dr Rank too. This character does not develop the play very much but he is a symbol of moral corruption though his selfless and humble nature endears him to most leaders. When he dies, very few people get emotional and this illustrates his insignificance in the society.

The character that ruins the life of the protagonist is Nils Krogstad. He is the loan shark that lent Norah the loan, and his boss is Torvald Helmer whom he sees as a threat to the security of his job. He tries to make a good name to keep his job because his past performance has not been excellent but he ends up blackmailing Norah to safeguard his career. He threatens to expose Norah’s secret to Torvald and this really scares her because she knows that she has committed a grave crime. He therefore asks Norah to influence her husband to help him safeguard his career and in return for his silence on the loan issue. He is the antagonist in this play though his antagonism is not villainous but his willingness to torment Torvald’s wife exposes his cruel nature. He is somehow sympathetic to her and this can be illustrated when he says “Every Shylock has some little feelings” (Ibsen 89). He discourages Norah from committing suicide and he behaves the way does because he has a meaningful personal motive. He wants to keep his job which on the balance because he does not want to expose his family to the vagaries of a tainted reputation. Just like Mrs. Helmer, Krogstad has been wronged by the society and both characters have forged signatures though the latter’s crime is minor and hardly breaks any law. However, the society stigmatises him by perceiving him as a criminal and the isolation he suffers impedes his personal and career progress (Williams 40). He is a victim of circumstances and his odds with morality started when his suitor called Mrs. Linde left him for a wealthy man who would easily provide for her unlike Krogstad who had to struggle to make her happy. Social forces thus forced Mrs Linde from Krogstad prompting him to resort to corporate crime and though the unfairness of the society towards this antagonist cannot justify his criminal actions, it helps to bring him close to another victim of the society, Mrs. Helmer and helps to wither away the reader’s perception of Krogstad as despicable character.

In conclusion, a biographical analysis of this play cannot be complete without references to Norah Helmer, the main character, Torvald, Dr Rank and the main antagonist, called Nils Krogstad. The blackmail of Nils Krogstad, the forgery of Norah Helmer and the final reaction of Torvald Helmer are the main highlights of this play.

Works Cited

Ibsen, Henrique. A Doll’s House. London: Nick Hern Books, 1994.

McFarlane, James. The Cambridge companion to Ibsen. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994.

Unwin, Stephen. Ibsen’s A Doll’s House: Study Guide. London: Nick Hern Books, 1997.

Williams, Thomas. Parallels in A Doll’s House. Chicago: Monmouth, 1997.

Two female characters Nora from A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen and Elisa from The Chrysanthemums by John Steinbeck have many similar characteristics. Both are women who live with husbands who do not understand them and do not feel the things as women do.

Both characters are intelligent women who need to change their life, but being brutalized by husbands, they do not know how to improve the life. However, there is also a number of differences in the characters’ behavior. One woman stays in the same place with the same conditions and another does away towards the new happy life.

The story of John Steinbeck describes only one day of life of the character, while Henrik Ibsen uses three acts in order to provide the whole picture and to describe the rise of the conflict in details and its future culmination. One can notice that these two stories and their major female characters are similar, as they both face the similar circumstances; however, on the other hand, Nora and Elisa demonstrate different reactions on the circumstances that married life provides.

The play A Doll’s House describes the nature of the relationship between husband and wife. Ibsen as the founder of realist drama uses the ideas, events and characters which are typical in the usual life. According to Goldman, the main ideas of this play are “the Social Lie and Duty” (1914).

Ibsen provides the description of the social duty of woman in a home as the sacred institution. In the world ruled by men the place of women is at home. Some of people willingly accept this way; however, for other people such way of life can be a complicated challenge.

The female character, Nora, seems deeper and more intelligent than her husband Torvald. The woman has many ideas, dreams and hopes; she wants to have better life and feels that all this routine of married life with Torvald kills her personality. She sees that her husband is not that person that she imagined. He is narcissistic and does not care about Nora, children or home. Nora’s enthusiasm does not allow her to be a simple house wife, a doll of her husband.

Obviously, there are many women who can accept such way of life; however, Nora is not one of them. She is not a doll and she cannot live with someone who considers her as a doll, as a toy. Nora’s life seems complicated and painful. However, she struggles for her happiness. On the other hand, many people can say that in this situation Torvald is the real victim.

It may be complicated to comprehend how woman could leave her children; however, for Nora, such method seems only one and right solution. She wants to survive in this world and to start the life from the new page. Ibsen does not provide the ideas about Nora’s future and what she is going to do, where to go and how to life. Nevertheless, the author emphasizes an importance of the personal choice in spite of life of a doll.

A short story The Chrysanthemums describes a life of a strong and proud Elisa Allen. Although this woman has the outstanding principles, intellect, she is kind and well-behavior, her life is full of frustration and even sorrow. She cannot have a child and her husband loses his interest toward Elisa as a woman. Only one good thing she has is her garden where the woman can cultivate the chrysanthemums.

In this context, the flower is a symbol of every woman who feels frustrated and lonely. Devoting all the energy to the house and garden, Elisa is unable to find more interesting business that could draw her attention, to bring more color to her life. Although the flowers are beautiful and make the life brighter, they are not humans; they cannot provide the same feeling, emotions or help to develop the life. Elisa is ignored and lost in her own home.

The evident mood of this story is the total melancholy. The first sentence is a bright demonstration of this statement: “The high gray-flannel fog of winter closed off the Salinas Valley from the sky and from all the rest of the world” (Steinbeck). The city of the heroes is closed from all the world as well as Elisa is closed in her house. It is the story of the desperate house wife where a happy-end seems like an incredible miracle.

One can see the similarities between the image of Elisa and Nora, because both women are intelligent, passionate and unsatisfied by the life that they have to maintain. Both of the characters care about their home. Thus, Elisa’s home is “hard-swept and hard-polished” (Steinbeck), while Nora’s “room furnished comfortably and tastefully, but not extravagantly” (Ibsen).

Both of the stories take place in winter. In this context, the season can be considered as a symbolical expression of mood o the characters. However, if Elisa’s winter may last for a long time, Nora tries to reach the spring of her existence. Perhaps, the life of Nora seems more interesting, because she has children, friends and one man is even in love with her.

At the same time, Elisa seems absolutely lonely and her only friends are flowers. She gets an opportunity express herself only in the conversation with the tinker. However, when this man disappears, Elisa feels even worse than before. Sweet indicates that after the meet with tinker, Elisa “becomes more and more feminine” (212). At the beginning, Nora and Torvald seem normal and happy family.

The author describes their every-days life in details. On the other hand, the beginning of The Chrysanthemums seems already melancholic and cold. It is possible to suppose that Elisa’s married life is full of problems. However, such fast way of determining the problem is caused by the characteristics of a genre of the short story, in spite of play, where the author has the space and time to describe the conflict slowly, preparing the readers for the culmination.

Nora and Elisa demonstrate different reaction on the crisis. While Elisa collapses and gives up, Nora leaves her family and believes in the better future and changes in her own life. Nora does not want to help her husband. She understands that if he did not want to change something in their life before, he will never do it. Therefore, being a clever and intelligent woman, she finds the solution and abandons her family before she will lose herself and lose her dreams. Such culmination seems unusual for 19th century.

Analysis of the cultural background demonstrates that women’s role in the West was simple and all house wives were mostly dependent on their family and especially on their husbands (Mayer 8). On the other hand, Elisa cannot find enough straights to make an important step. She loses her ability to reflect rationally. The ends of two stories are absolutely different. Elisa does not want to argue with her husband and turns up her collar, crying like an old woman.

One day of Elisa’s life can be compared with all her life. The reader can suppose that every day of Elisa is the same as the one described in the story. At the end of A Dolls’ House, Nora turns back on the family and goes away, choosing her own road in this world and making a step forward the new life.

Analyzing the stories A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen and Elisa from The Chrysanthemums by John Steinbeck, one can see the different reactions and responses to the problems and various challenges that married life provides.

Although the major characters of two stories have the similar circumstances, the culminations of their problems are different. One woman decides to leave her husband and children, while another continues suffering. It is obvious that both authors sympathize their female characters; however, they choose different solutions for them.

It is natural that people react in the different way as we all have different characteristics, emotional range, experience and communicational skills. Some people prefer to fight and to improve their life. They know when to stop and make a step. Nora is an example of such personality. Vice versa, Elisa shows an example of an opposite personality, a woman who cannot decide how to solve the problems and to develop her life.

Works Cited

Goldman, Emma. The Social Significance of the Modern Drama. Boston: Richard g. Barger, 1914. Web. <http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/goldman/>.

Ibsen, Henrik. A Doll’s House. Gutenberg.org. Web..

Mayer, Laura Reis. Henrik Ibsen: A Doll’s House: A Teacher’s Guide to the Signet Classics Edition. US: Penguin Books, 2008. Print.

Steinbeck, John. The Chrysanthemums. Web..

Sweet, Charles A. Jr. “Mr. Elisa Allen and Steinbeck’s “The Chrysanthemums.” Modern Fiction Studies. Ed. William T. Stafford and Margaret Church. Vol. 20. West Lafayette: Purdue University, 1974. 210-214. Print.

The theme of gender inequality and the necessity for women to prove and protect their rights is important in modern society, as well as frequently discussed in many literary works. Each author introduces a unique way to understand the impact of subjugation on female decision-making and realize if women can resist the challenges of the world they have to live in. Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House and Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale contain several literary devices with the help of which the authors send provocative messages to the reader. This paper focuses on the setting in the works A Doll’s House and The Handmaid’s Tale and its impact on the characters and the author’s context through the prism of the chosen historical periods, culture, and the presence or absence of the narrator in the story.

Importance of Setting

The setting in a story is not only a geographical location of the characters. This literary device is usually used to underline the significance of the chosen period and to identify various external factors that may influence the reader’s understanding of the author’s message and characters’ lives. On the one hand, the settings in the works by Ibsen and Atwood vary considerably. The events of A Doll’s House are developed in Helmer’s “beautiful, happy home” where its owners develop relationships with other characters (Ibsen 14). The author does not find it necessary to change the location focusing on people, their hidden and evident intentions, problems, and opportunities. The Handmaid’s Tale does not have one particular place for interpretation but introduces the Republic of Gilead that “knows no bounds” as it is “within you” (Atwood 23). The alternative future deprives women of freedoms or choices and supports the ideas of totalitarianism and the absence of order.

On the other hand, the settings of both stories have many things in common proving that despite the place of living, women continue facing serious problems. Injustice, men’s power, and social obligations bind women hand and foot without any chance to change something without some sacrifice being made. In A Doll’s House, Nora decides to leave the family and break all relationships with her friends, and in The Handmaid’s Tale, it is suicide as the only way out.

Characters and the Setting

The choice of the setting plays an important role in the characters’ lives. Both authors find it necessary to pay much attention to the conditions in which the main characters have to live. In Ibsen’s play, the description of the room before each act helps to deepen the image of the family whose “room comfortably and tastefully, but not expensively, furnished” with a pianoforte, a round table, armchairs, and a small sofa (4). This setting is common for many European suburbs of that period, meaning that the setting does not impact the characters but helps to learn more about them.

In The Handmaid’s Tale, the impact of the settings turns to be more significant compared to A Doll’s House. The chosen ambiguity of the places makes the reader stay cautious about the events that may be developed in the story. In the beginning, people have a chance to enjoy that “the lawns are tidy, the facades are gracious, in good repair; they’re like the beautiful pictures… to print in the magazines about homes and gardens and interior decorations” (Atwood 23). At the same time, “the same absence of people, the same air of being asleep. The street is almost like a museum, or a street in a model town constructed to show the way people used to live” (Atwood 23). Such comparison proves that people cannot live the way they want. They have to follow the rules and models imposed on them without their agreement. Instead of enjoying the beauty of places, the characters have to fake their emotions, feelings, and attitudes just to be suitable for the environment.

Author’s Context and the Setting

The used settings determine the author’s context in both stories in different ways. Ibsen suggests investigating the role of a woman in society through the observation of a certain situation in the house. He decides to introduce a story free from judgments and prejudice and provide the reader with a chance to interpret his context, using personal imagination and attitudes to the problem. Atwood, in her turn, provides the main character, Offred, with the right to tell her story. Though the reader cannot know if it is possible to trust this narrator or if the narrator can cover all aspects of the situation, the setting strengthens the author’s context and proves the correctness of this approach.

Conclusion

In general, Ibsen’s A Doll’s House and Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale contain examples of strong and helpful settings for understanding characters and authors’ contexts. Gender inequality, including men’s power and women’s weaknesses, is the problem of different societies and many centuries. It is hard to find one common solution for this concern. The chosen authors show how characters may be influenced by the setting and explain that the outcome of inequality is hard to predict. Still, the main idea of salvation from domination remains the same, whether it is a decision to leave everything behind and start a new life or step up and choose the darkness.

Works Cited

Atwood, Margaret. The Handmaid’s Tale. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1986.

Ibsen, Henrik. A Doll’s House. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2015.

Introduction

The Little Foxes is a play that was written by Lillian Hellman in 1939. It is considered a piece of classic drama, and in 1941 it was already put on the screen with additional scenes and dialogues. In this story, the plot revolves around Regina Hubbard Giddens and her family. They are all from the South, and, taking into account the time when the action takes place (the year 1900), Regina strives for financial stability and autonomy. In the play, the author explores such topics as human greed, money, toxic family relationships and values, and puts moral boundaries to the test.

In Henrik Ibsen’s realistic play A Doll’s House, some of these points are also unfolded. This story takes place in the 19th century, and here the main focus is also on a woman, Nora Helmer, who is a wife and a mother as well. She spends almost half of the play under the impression that, despite several troubles, her marriage is almost perfect. However, later, Nora slowly starts to discover that her controlling husband treats her like a doll. Her position in her superficially pretty life is very unstable. The discussion below will compare and contrast the mentioned plays in order to define whether they contain a number of similarities or not through various perspectives.

Plays’ Plots

A Doll’s House’s Plot

Nora is the name of the main character of the play – a happy, infantile, childishly selfish woman. Since childhood, Nora was dad’s favorite daughter, then from dad’s hands, she immediately switched to the role of the beloved wife of a successful lawyer Helmer. Nora has three wonderful children, an ideal husband, and a life without worries and hassles.

The action begins to unfold on Christmas Eve, when a guest enters the Helmer house, in whose tired and aged face the fresh and radiant Nora does not immediately recognize her university friend who has known many hardships of life. She came to their city to look for a job and hopes to get a job in a bank, the director of which recently became Nora’s husband. Nora’s carefree life ends here – until that day, no one knew that she had a terrible, criminal secret (Ibsen, 1829). This secret threatens to come out, ruin the life of her entire family, or lead to even more fatal consequences.

The Little Foxes’ Plot

Brothers Ben and Oscar Hubbard, merchants and bankers, prepare to sign an agreement with an industrialist to open a spinning mill near their cotton plantation. Once Oscar got married only because his wife owned this plantation. Since then, the poor woman is unhappy in this family, whose members are only interested in money and profit. Now, for the agreement to come into force, Ben and Oscar need money from Horace, the husband of their sister Regina. Enraged that her plans are collapsing before our eyes, Regina expresses to her husband everything that has hurt since the wedding. Horace is offended; he starts to get nervous and is about to take medicine, but he breaks the vial. Regina does nothing to help him, and Horace dies of a heart attack (Hellman, 1939). After her husband’s death, Regina demands half of the profits from the brothers. In the finale, Regina is left alone with her wealth and spiritual emptiness.

Plays’ Comparison

It seems rational to claim that both stories focus on women, striving for some form of independence, one way or another. Ibsen’s play was even criticized for feminist motives. Nora and Regina share the same marital status, and they both have children. The main characters are both involved in some kind of scheme. For example, Regina promises to keep her brothers’ crimes secret in exchange for the desired part of the inheritance. The following claim confirms the latter statement, “I have forgotten that you ever saw the bonds… as long as you boys both behave yourselves” (Hellman, 1939, p. 490). With such tools as her sharp mind and cunning and sometimes heartless manipulations, for the sake of money, Regina watches her husband Horace die, blackmails her brothers ruthlessly and, consequently, loses her daughter’s trust forever.

She is willing to overlook any unjust deed to get what she wants. Whereas Nora lies to her husband about getting the money for the trip to Italy from her father, when, in reality, she borrowed them illegally (Ibsen 1829). The difference between their schemes is that Nora decides to lie to help her sick husband; she thinks about her family.

Regina, on the other hand, gets involved in her foul play for herself, and she does not hesitate to step on people in the process. This turns out to be exactly why she is punished. Another similarity would be the fact that both main characters are left all alone in the end. Regina’s daughter abandons her, and Nora willingly leaves her so-called doll’s house, which she spent so much time decorating. Both characters obtain freedom and break free from the boundaries and clichés about what women are capable and incapable of, and they pay a high price for it.

Three is a crowd, they say, but another female figure cannot be ignored. It is Birdie, an aristocrat, and Oscar Hubbard’s wife. Her unhappiness forces her into excessive drinking; she is constantly ill-treated by her husband. Being the third of the siblings, he probably feels the lack of power in the family, which he takes out on his wife. Oscar married her because of her cotton farm and a large plantation. As a result, Birdie is seen more as an object rather than as a human being. The same parallel exists with Ibsen’s Nora, who realized that to her husband, she was a doll to be played with and admired (Ibsen, 1829). Such an objectifying makes another similarity between the two plays.

As for the main characters’ husbands, they both have power in their hands. However, Horace, who has a bad heart, looks weaker, as opposed to Torvald, who manages to improve his health with his wife’s help. Regina, in contrast, wants her husband to die sooner (Hellman, 1939). Before this happens, though, she cannot do much to take the situation into her hands. Just like Nora’s husband, who even fixes her dance steps, Horace controls the resource that his wife wants to obtain.

Here, it should be noticed that the wives are not the only ones being controlled and used in preconceived motives. In The Little Foxes, the children, specifically Leo and Alexandra, can be seen as foot soldiers in their parents’ war. The latter plan their steps wisely, and young people’s feelings do not even matter when the idea of Leo and Alexandra’s beneficial marriage arises. This expression confirms such an assumption, “You got to convince your Uncle Horace you going to make a fit husband for Alexandra” (Hellman, 1939, p. 449). Fortunately, this does not happen; however, Oscar’s son plays a mule role later when he is pushed to steal from Horace.

A similar attitude can be seen in Nora’s family, where she calls the children her dollies and later realizes that she only repeats her father’s fate and treats them like pretty little toys to play with (Ibsen, 1829). The difference between these arcs lies in the intentions. Adults in The Little Foxes manage their children like tools purposefully, whereas Nora does so without knowing. In the end, Regina seems to be apprehended when her daughter decides to leave her, but Nora does not look back, being sure that the little ones are in good hands.

Finally, both of these plays have very symbolic headlines, even though they are meant to attract attention to different issues. The name The Little Foxes comes from the Song of Solomon. The Hubbards have the necessary qualities to be associated with foxes; they are sly, witty, and prefer to act secretly. Such people only deserve to be called little, so this part is also fair. As for A Doll’s House, this name represents Nora’s illusions concerning her marriage, her relationships with her husband, and even childhood trauma.

Conclusion

To conclude, the above discussion shows that the two plays bear several similarities. The topics of toxic family relationships, control, and moral boundaries are explored in both plays. The main characters are women in search of control over their lives. Money also plays a huge role in both stories. However, the characters themselves are very different in their schemes and intentions. In the end, they are alone, but each of them reaches this point in different ways.

References

Hellman, L. (1939). The Little Foxes. In: L. Hartley & A. Ladu (Eds.), Patterns in modern drama: Ibsen, Chekhov, Galsworthy, O’Neill, Kelly, Thurber, Nugent, Hellman. Prentice-Hall.

Ibsen, H. (1829). A Doll’s House. T. Fisher Unwin.

Introduction

Drama is defined as a composition in verse or prose which expresses views on a critical subject through actors who take the position of the characters as they perform the action. It is a serious work of art intended for theatrical performance. There are many renowned dramatists who have produced compelling pieces of drama with intentions of passing across serious messages. The messages passed across in dramatic works are in literary language referred to as the themes.

Dramatic plays are usually comprised of more than one theme being. Among the most famous dramatists in the world is Henrick Ibsen who was born in Norway in 1828. Ibsen led unhappy life as a child causing him to be described as antisocial. During his writing career, he produced many dramatic works among them A Doll’s House. This text epitomizes how dramatic artists create works of art with the intentions of expressing different themes. Henrick Ibsen’s A Doll’s House brings out various themes.

Themes in A Doll’s House

Gender

Gender is one of the themes that Henrick Ibsen explores in the text A Doll’s House. This text highlights the different ways through which women are looked at and the roles they are assigned in society as family makers. One of the characters in the play, Torvald holds a narrow view of what women should do in society.

He is convinced that a woman has an obligation of playing the role of a caring and mother and wife. In addition, he explains to Nora that women are responsible for shaping the behaviors of their children. In a nutshell, his perception of women is that they are naive people who have no touch with reality but who nevertheless have a great role to play in providing moral sobriety through their influence in homes.

The idea of being a man is also evident in the text though not explicitly. Nora describes Torvald in a way that ascertains her partial awareness of the challenges both men and women face in society as they execute their roles. Torvald has his own perception of being a man and thinks that a man should be entirely independent. This compelling urge to remain independent may alienate him and make him disregard the interdependence nature of human beings.

Nora’s father is mentioned quite often in the play, a fact that makes him equal to his daughter because of the deeds of the daughter. Nora was responsible for the money they spend for their trip in Italy although many people on the contrary think the money came from the father. Nora is equally decisive although many people seem not to agree with it and she has the privilege of accessing what is deemed to be reserved for men. She is aware of the limitations she faces simply because she is a woman.

Family and Parental Obligations

The role of parents in a family is another theme explored in this play. Dr. Rank, Torvald and Nora believe that parents are expected to be people of high integrity. They opine that a parent’s immoral traits are transferred to the children the same way diseases are transmitted. Dr. Rank is suffering from a disease that is attributed with the misconduct of his father. He perceives his contraction of the disease as a result of his father’s involvement with many women.

He is therefore bearing the brunt of the gross misconduct of his father. Torvald seems to argue that the moral character of a child is highly determined by the parents. To confirm his proposition, he tells Nora ‘Nearly all young criminals had lying mothers.’ (Mcmahan, Day and Funk 45). He does also do not want the interaction of Nora with the children after discovering that she tells lies. This he does to ensure that Nora does not influence the children negatively.

Despite the filial obligation associated with parents to their children, the play also advises that children should also take care of their parents. Nora is brought out as having seen the importance of this but decided not to honor it since she stuck to her ailing husband instead of finding time to be with her father.

Mrs. Linde did the opposite by shunning all her ambitions to remain with her sick mother. Ibsen does not say who between these two women should be condemned but uses this scenario to show that family roles are complex and that they are expected from both sides.

Delusion of Appearances

Appearances in this play deprive the characters of their capacity to perceive reality hence they act in the wrong ways. From the start of the play, Nora is portrayed as a foolish woman but as the play goes on she turns out to be an intelligent and focused lady. Torvald is initially portrayed as a dependable husband but later we learn that he is a coward for he fears being involved in a scandal.

Krogstad turns out to be sympathetic, a quality he did not exhibit before. The end of the play is a moment of unraveling the hidden identities of the characters. There also seems to be hate between Mrs. Linde and Krogstad but this later turns to be love (Mcmahan, Day and Funk 20).

Conclusion

Henrick Ibsen has succeeded in bringing out various themes in his play A Doll’s house. The essay has explored how effectively the theme of gender is presented in the play. Both men and women in the play have varied perceptions of gender. For instance, Torvald perceives women as weak people who cannot offer any positive contribution.

However, women are depicted strongly when Nora provides money for their trip to Italy. There is also the theme of parental and filial obligations where a reciprocal relationship is expressed. Parents should be responsible for the welfare of their children just like children should be responsible for the welfare of their parents. Delusion of appearances are also evident as we discover that what characters or situations appear to be at first is not what they turn out to be eventually.

Works Cited

Mcmahan, elizabeth, Susan Day and Robert Funk. Literature and the Writing Process. Canada: Pearson Education Canada, 2010.Print

The role of women in the society of the 19^th century is a rather controversial point for the discussion in literature because of the fact the end of the century can be characterized as the period of the women’s awakening and starting their struggle for the real equality in rights with men. Henrik Ibsen presented his vision of the woman’s position in the society in the play A Doll’s House which became the sensation because of the accents on the problematic social questions.

The play was performed on stage many times, and there are several film adaptations of Ibsen’s work. It is necessary to pay attention to the film adaptation of 1973 directed by Patrick Garland, starring Claire Bloom and Anthony Hopkins.

Although stage productions and film adaptations often reflect the director’s vision of the play and its problems which can differ from the playwright’s idea, Garland’s adaptation of A Doll’s House can be discussed as the effective interpretation of the problems of the woman’s social position and the human personal freedom developed by Ibsen in his play.

The main strong feature of the film is its strict dependence on the play’s plot and the author’s description of the settings which was followed thoroughly. It is possible to notice only few details which were changed by the director to provide the audience with the feeling of the real situation.

It is necessary to pay attention to several excursions outside when the main scenes are developed in the house of Torvald Helmer. Thus, there are no significant transformations in the plot to meet the director’s intentions, and such additions as the developed scene of the ball can be discussed as the device to emphasize the main characters’ emotions with the help of accentuating their actions. From this point, the director tries to represent not only his vision of the play, but interpret the work according to the playwright’s ideas.

The problems which are discussed in the play and in the film are the questions of the women’s social rights, their position in the men’s society, the issue of the personal freedom, the problem of relations between men and women in the family as a result of the impact of social gender stereotypes.

Patrick Garland has no intention to add some modern issues to the discussion in the film, but the ideas developed in the adaptation can be discussed as current for the social situation of the 1970s when the movement to protect the women’s rights was especially active.

It is also possible to determine the other important messages which were developed in the play and film such as the problems of friendship, blackmail, and lying for the benefit of the other person. The positive features of Garland’s film adaptation are in following Ibsen’s ideas to emphasize their revolutionary character, vividness, and currency.

Nora, the main female character of the play, is the woman who comes through definite stages of her personal development, realizing that her life was rather artificial, and her house was only a doll’s house where the family values were insignificant in comparison with the importance of the social status and image (Ibsen).

It is an interesting fact that Claire Bloom also participated in the adaptations of Ibsen’s play on stage that is why the role of Nora is close and familiar for the actress, and Bloom’s acting can be considered as persuasive an emotional. In his adaptation, Garland concentrates on the emotional state of Nora and her feelings and accentuates her inner struggle and considerations with the help of the cameraman’s work when the shots are changed in relation to the changes in Nora’s emotions and her attitude to the husband (“A Doll’s House”).

Nora is traditionally perceived as the childish woman, who cannot make the independent decisions, but her character develops during the play, and the audience has the opportunity to observe the willed person who wants to be respected by her husband because of her devotion and her ability to act independently.

Bloom’s Nora represents all the stages of the character’s development successfully. Furthermore, it is possible to observe the changes in Nora’s tone of the voice, her movements, and gestures. Her speech changes along with her perception of the reality, and there are no signs of childishness in Nora at the end of the film (“A Doll’s House”).

One of the most interesting director’s approaches to accentuate the emotional state of Nora is the scene with the Christmas ball when Nora dances the Tarantella. Ibsen used the symbolic meaning of this dance to accentuate Nora’s gaining the feeling of the personal freedom in spite of the pressure of the social prejudice.

Thus, Garland accentuated the scene and used it to present the female character’s emotions as a kind of her opposition to the society with its norms because the norms and rules limited the women’s rights. Moreover, the scenes with a dancing heroine are also important to emphasize the chaos in her thoughts and feelings, which is represented with the help of the outstanding cameraman’s work.

To determine the difficulties which can be experienced by the woman in the society of the 19^th century, it is necessary to focus on the male characters of the play. Nora’s husband Torvald Helmer is depicted as the person who does not perceive Nora seriously. Thus, Nora is just a little child or even Torvald’s doll.

Helmer’s attitude is also accentuated with the help of using definite names for Nora. For instance, perceiving Nora as a child, he says that she is a “little squirrel” (Ibsen 168). However, when Nora does not meet his expectations Helmer is inclined to forget about his attitude to the wife, and he discusses her as a betrayer who does not think about the husband’s social status and image.

The problem is in the fact that Nora thinks and cares for her husband, but Helmer does not notice her efforts. Garland sticks to the text, and the character of Torvald Helmer presented by Anthony Hopkins can be discussed as responding to the audience’s perception of Ibsen’s Torvald. Moreover, Hopkins’ character is even colder and more possessive in comparison with Ibsen’s portraying the character.

The figure of Krogstad in the film does not attract the audience’s attention because the duet of Bloom and Hopkins makes the vivid kernel of the film.

Garland adapted the play with references to the details and careful interpretation of the main themes, but he also paid much attention to the characters’ casting. Bloom and Hopkins’ acting are among the positive aspects of the film because they make the drama alive and touching.

That is why, Garland’s accents on Nora and Torvald’s final dialogues are based on Bloom and Hopkins’ great acting. Furthermore, the increase of the distance between the spouses is stressed with the help of using the shots to present the characters and the changes in their appearances and emotions (“A Doll’s House”).

Garland made good attempts to emphasize the provocative character and controversy of Nora’s decision to leave her home. While reading the play, it is possible to pay attention to the tension of the moment, and this tension was vividly represented by the actors in the final scene.

Thus, Nora tries to rebel against the social norms supported by her husband which are not correlated with her vision of the good actions, and she feels her freedom to make her own decisions without being afraid of the public’s opinion.

Patrick Garland’s film adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s play A Doll’s House can be discussed as successful because the director sticks to the playwright’s text, follows Ibsen’s ideas without adding another meanings and messages to the points discussed in the play.

From this perspective, the film is the real adaptation of the play when the director’s position is in interpreting the play’s text carefully and representing it with the help of a camera. Moreover, it is necessary to pay attention to the good choice of the actors for the film because the acting of Claire Bloom and Anthony Hopkins can be analyzed as emotional and vivid.

Thus, the evolution of Nora’s character is presented with proper references to the text, and Hopkins’ Torvald can impress the public with his coldness and definite snobbism typical for the men of upper-middle class in the 19^th century.

Works Cited

A Doll’s House. 1973. Video file. Web.

Ibsen, Henrik. “A Doll’s House”. Portable Legacies: Fiction, Poetry, Drama, Nonfiction. Ed. Jan Zlotnik Schmidt and Lynne Crockett. USA: Cengage Heinle, 2008. 167-231. Print.