Question: Discuss A Doll House as a feminist play.
Or, “A Doll’s House” is a play about a women’s self-discovery and liberation. Discuss.
Introduction
Henrik Johann Ibsen (1828-1906) is without a doubt one of the leading playwrights of the 19th century. After Shakespeare, Ibsen is the most frequently performed playwright in the world. His best play A Doll’s House (1879) earned him international acclaim and acceptance as the first major innovative playwright in the history of international literature. The play focuses on patriarchy, confusion, rebellion, self-worth, liberation.
The key concept of feminism
Feminism is a movement that seeks to define and establish social, legal, and cultural freedoms and equality for women. It advocates for the rights of women on the basis of gender equality in all spheres of life. The goal of feminism as a literary movement is to rebel against a patriarchal society.
Concentrate on the marital relationship
A Doll’s House is a drama about the marital relationship between Nora Helmer and Torvald Helmer. Until the end, Nora is presented as a dutiful wife who fulfills every need of her husband and the patriarchal society. She loves her husband and does everything to make him happy. The following statement of Nora shows her love for her husband it also symbolizes her submissiveness:
“I am free from care now…to be able to play and romp with the children; To be able to keep the house beautifully and have everything just as Torvald likes it!”.
Nora’s love and respect for her husband Torvald are evident when she warns Krogstad not to say anything against him:
“If you speak slightingly of my husband, I shall turn you out of my house.”
The desire for identity
“…And, think of it, soon the spring will come and the big blue sky! Perhaps we shall be able to take a little trip – perhaps I shall see the sea again! Oh, it’s a wonderful thing to be alive and be happy.”
Nora’s desire, here, symbolizes all women’s desire for identity and freedom. Ibsen also ridiculed the irrational patriarchal ideology by which a woman was considered a trivial sexual object.
More Notes: Continental Literature
Economic dependence
Another concern of feminism is women’s economic dependence on influential male members of society:
Nora: “Well, then I have found other ways of earning money…it was a tremendous pleasure to sit there working and earning money. It was like being a man.”
From this, it is understood that a woman seeks liberation from her domesticity. When Krogstad threatens to reveal to her husband the secret of lending two hundred and fifty pounds to her, she shows her confidence in her husband. In the second act of the play, Torvald assures Nora that he will bear any inconvenience from Krogstad and that he will accept everything himself. However, all these have been proved false. When Torvald finally finds out that Nora has taken a loan from Krogstad and forged her father’s signature, he scolds her for being a liar, a hypocrite, and a criminal without giving her a chance to explain the whole incident:
“What a horrible awakening! All these eight years- she who was my joy my pride- a hypocrite, a liar- worse, worse,- a criminal…And I must sink to such miserable depths because of a thoughtless woman!”
Reasonable advocacy for women
It is at this point that the real character of Nora emerges into view. She now wants to have a serious talk with Helmer and she begins to speak to him in a very self-confident and self-assertive manner. It is now her turn to impeach and indict Helmer. She tells him that like her father he too had wronged her greatly. Her father had treated her as his baby doll and thereafter Helmer has been treating her always as his doll wife. Nora’s remarks naturally have a nagging effect on Hemler. She says that her duty to Hemler and her child is no bigger to her than her duty to herself since she first and foremost is a human just as Hemler is.
Nora: “I don’t believe that any longer. I believe that before all else I am a reasonable human being, just as you are.”
So, she leaves her family to fetch out her freedom and this is the paradigm of hidden power of women.
Conclusion
In fine, we can assert that “A Doll’s House” is a representative feminist drama. The title of the play, on the one hand, symbolizes the stinginess of a woman’s freedom and on the other hand, it suggests that women are considered as puppets in a patriarchal society. The play is a critique of patriarchal prejudice and discrimination. ‘It depicts the position of women in society and their behavior by men: lack of real love.
