To What Extent Would a Modern-Day Contemporary Audience Relate to ‘A Doll’s House’

This essay discusses the relatability of ‘A Doll’s House’ to a modern-day contemporary audience, highlighting the portrayal of women in the late 1800s society and their roles as homemakers.

Running head: DOLL’S HOUSE
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The aim of this essay is to discuss the topic “To what extent would a modern-day
contemporary audience relate to ‘A Doll’s House’”. This particular play by Henrik Ibsen
primarily focusses on the role of the woman in this specific social and cultural context. The story
of this play revolves round the personality and actions of the main character Nora Helmer wo is
represented as the homemaker. Through this particular paly, the playwright has represented how
the women used to be treated in the late 1800s society. ‘A Doll’s House’ has an essential impact
on the general roles because it presents the life of woman who were not allowed to work in the
corresponding field. This ideology is perfectly shown through the characterization of the main
character where the women are responsible only to raise their children. They actually do not wok
and spend luxurious time by spending their partner’s earnings.
Ibsen has portrayed this woman character as very dependent on the financial security
given by the husband which Nora cannot arrange herself. Nora in this play has once stated that it
is fortunate and glorious feeling having a husband with fair income. This statement however
indicates that she is happy that she does not need to work has her husband does for her. By
referring the income fat Helmer states that her husband earns right amount of income which
makes her dependent on her husband supporting the Napoleonic code that spread across the
Europe. This shows the actual relationship of Nora with Torvald capturing the woman’s initiative
to break her dolls’ house.
The women never had the same priorities as the men had therefore, when Nora decides to
do the manly job, she feels very tired and this word has been repeated for many times throughout
the play. This indicates that the process of earning money is too hard for the women but when
Nora reflects that “it was tremendous fun”. This Fun contradicts the society’s understanding of
the women and their potential as it has never allowed women to try jobs actually done my men

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only. Therefore, neither society nor the women in the society do not whether their ca perform
these tasks anyhow. This makes Nora happy as she finds out that it is like being a man doing
their tasks or even better than they do. Women in some cases can handled the jobs more easily
than their male counter parts.
The playwright has captured that when Nora is disappointed, she loves to spend her
husband’s money. She shares her feeling stating that “When a poor girl’s been in trouble, she
must make the best of things.” Here in this sentence, the girl refers to the women who seek
support from the men when in distress. This shows the women are fond of sending money rather
than earning them. as Nora is not employed, her husband thinks that she is having a perfect life
without anything to think or bother to earn money. Here Torvald has supports this act as he
thinks that he “is so terribly in love with [her] that he says he wants [her] all to himself.” He is
over protective to his wife and Nora is more an object than a human being. Despite the fact that
Nora does not like to be overprotected by her husband rather wants his love. She wants to be
happy by his love and not his money. Nora’s reference to the phrase "wants me all to himself"
details how she is treated by her husband as an object and how Torvald gets jealous when Nora
mentions by her old friends back home. These phrases detail how Nora as a human being is
treated by her husband. Unlike other women of her times, she is treated like a doll whom her
husband actually manipulates. All her movements are dependent upon Torvald. Nora’s character
is however more submissive as she thinks that it is not unnatural and the husband will be
possessing his wife and control her. She desires to be a perfect wife and conforms the gender
roles even if this comes replacing her own happiness.
Nora is convinced that she needs to man’s help for every situation. therefore, when
Krogstad was blackmailing her, she became desperate for finding a solution. She visited Dr.

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Rank for helping her as he is a man in one hand and has money on the other. The statement, “A
man’s better at coping with these things than a woman” reflects Dr. Bank to be more powerful
than Nora. He has financial power as well as legal support with him. Here Nora is convinced
with the sexist idea that the women are not suited for handling such serious matters for which she
needs the help from men to cope up with the recent predicament.
In the society, the men have become dominant and believe that they can treat women
worse. They understand the women will not be able to do anything or fight back. This is due to
the fact that the women will lose everything if they protest. Through every statement of Torvald,
the readers find that he thinks himself to be a perfect mand and Nora must need him to her fullest
as she worth nothing without him. The word ‘proper’ refers to the fact that men take
responsibilities of the worm and considered to be coward if does not take care of the wife. The
wives are considered to be the jewelry for the title which shows their wealth by having wives.
Nora considers both her father as well as her husband to treat her like a doll. These men
have made her life a doll’s house. She thinks herself to be a doll child of her father and a doll
wife of her husband now her children have become her dolls. She remembers how her husband
used to play with her as a doll and had fun bow she is doing the same with her children. From
this discussion, the title of this play becomes clear to understand. The main character of Ibsen’s
paly thus acknowledges that she has loved her doll life under the control of her father as well as
her husband. She enjoys the moments of her doll life, playing with her husband as well as her
children. Here Ibsen has pointed out that as the husband loves to play the role of the perfect
husband caring and overprotecting his wife, the wife is also plying the role of perfect wife,
delighted to perform for her husband and being an obedient wife.

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Nora, though a perfect wife, cannot go out of control of her husband. She has the courage
to think of herself bit also realizes that her wellbeing completely depends upon her ability to
remain under the control of her husband and being the doll of his. She states whenever she starts
to think about herself, she finds that she needs to remain within the control of her husband. She
needs to do the usual things for the women which is the dependency on men and remain alert to
take the orders from their men. Ibsen in this particular play wants to show that the women also
have their desires or opinions too but doing them or accomplish those desires are never the
option for the women. Through this main character Nora, Ibsen has asked the question why do
the women never ask for their liberty. Protesting against being controlled by the men was quite
common in Ibsen’s time also and he witnessed this in his own family more specifically with his
mother. This is the reason why the playwright wants to let her audience know how to act in such
situation. He tries to connect his real-life incident in this play and tries as if Nora speaking up
and protesting for all the women of her times who have become dolls in tehri house by their male
counterparts. Thus, Nora becomes the most dominate character in this play.
Therefore, it can be concluded that the play namely ‘A Doll’s House’ sends a message
how the women in the 1800s used to be treated by their male family members. This also conveys
the message that how the women must be treated and this is not less than the men in the society.
As this play was written in 1800s, there are many changes in comparison to the modern times.
However, in the recent times, there are many changes regarding the equality of the women and
they enjoy more power than they used to do previously. In the modern times, the women have
more freedom but some of the manly tasks, the women preferably avoid like mining for example.
All of these have been marked to be the indicators of the improvement of the women situation in

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the society and this getting better over time. In future, the women empowerment will make the
society more equal.