When Nora Helmer slammed the door of her doll's house in 1879, her message sent shockwaves around the world that endure to this day. “I must remain entirely alone,” Nora declares, “if I am to understand myself and all that concerns me” (Ibsen 64). After years of playing the role of a superficial doll, Nora transforms into an assertive and determined woman. While the significant events of A Doll's House precipitate her sudden actions, the true cause of Nora's transformation stems from an internal revolution. Ibsen dramatizes the discovery of Nora's identity through various literary techniques. In the show's finale, Nora has survived a searing deconstruction of her false sense of self, the doll, and experiences the equally painful emergence of a new being, free of the social pressures and expectations that had haunted her for years. Through her transformation myth, Nora proves herself to be an ideal tragic hero. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay In the unreal world of A Doll's House, all roles and assumptions are elusive; “wife” and “mother” are the types of facades that represent the happy family game in which dolls masquerade as humans. Nora's double character is slowly revealed. She is at once a "macaroon-nibbling child-wife and a heroine of ethical living" (Durbach 63). Nora's struggle to find her own identity can be carefully examined through her comparisons with the other main characters in the story. In these experiences, the audience becomes increasingly aware of Nora's thought processes and true characteristics. As the game progresses, the doll dies and the walls of the dollhouse begin to crack; Nora Helmer becomes a different person. Nora's unraveling begins with the arrival of Christine Linde in Helmer's dollhouse. Nora's childhood friend, Linde appears to be everything Nora is not. From the moment she enters the play, she becomes a complete foil to Nora: an independent, displaced traveler enters the home of an immature, lush housewife. The image of "doll" versus "non-doll" is clear enough as the pale, thin, miserable Linde dresses in shabby traveling clothes while Nora talks about her lavish dress for an upcoming party. Nora chatters about her seemingly happy home life, almost as if she is excited to have a new guest in the dollhouse that she can "play" with. Christine talks about the tragedy that struck her: the death of her husband, which left her without money or children. Linde mocks Nora, saying that she knows “so little of the burdens and troubles of life” (Ibsen 10). “You're just like the others,” Nora replies. “Everyone thinks that I am incapable of anything really serious and that I have experienced nothing in this world of worries” (10). Nora immediately defends herself, pointing out that she had borrowed money, without Torvald's knowledge, to pay for the trip to Italy. What began as a physical juxtaposition of contrasting appearances now becomes a pattern of contrasting images with respect to femininity. "One after Nora's role as a wife; there are no children, which frees her from Nora's happily purposeful motherhood, there is no home, no property, which frees Christine from the routine itself, from Nora's happy domestic management in the its bourgeois paradise" (Durbach 95-96). Yet for all the independent values she personifies, Linde also exemplifies to Nora that the real world outside the dollhouse is cold, harsh, and loveless. Nora gets a better taste of the real world in her encounters with NilsKrogstad. A parallel irony is evident between these two: both are guilty of forgery. Krogstad is a mirror that reflects on Nor the image of a man whose fatal mistake leads him to be a victim of society. Although Krogstad's motive for confronting Nora is to secure a position in her husband's bank, her entry certainly threatens the safety of the dollhouse. If Linde is Nora's opposite, then Krogstad is her parallel. Under the skin, he and Nora are both criminals. It is extremely ironic that Krogstad threatens to blackmail Nora in an attempt to gain respect. It shows that desperate people can do desperate things, as Nora almost learns later in the play. In his second meeting with Krogstad, the two outcasts discuss suicide and the courage it takes to face it. NORA: I have enough courage to do it now. KROGSTAD: Oh, you can't scare me. A beautiful spoiled lady like you NORA: You'll see, you'll see.KROGSTAD: Under the ice, maybe? Down in the cold, coal-black water? And then, in the spring, floating to the surface, all hideous and unrecognizable, with my hair falling out... NORA: You can't scare me. KROGSTAD: And neither do you me. People don't do these things, Mrs. Helmer. (Ibsen 43-44) His request pushes Nora over the edge of indecision and gives her the courage to accept responsibility and the consequences of her actions. In the show's finale, the audience realizes that Krogstad is not the villain of the story. Rather, her husband is the real villain (more on that later). Similar to Krogstad's misery mirroring Nora's deception, Krogstad's eventual moral recovery and change parallel his metamorphosis of spirit. Before this final meeting with Krogstad, however, Nora confronts the dying Doctor Rank. Death and illness are indeed significant themes in the work, from Krogstad's moral illness to Rank's physical disorder. In Dr. Rank, Nora sees the mirror of her inevitable death. He is the primary representation of the reason for the disease, calling himself "the most miserable of all [his] patients" (37). As he suffers from "his father's youthful amusements", Rank demonstrates another theme of the story that corruption and malevolence are hereditary. Apparently, Nora is afraid that her deception will taint her children, and takes means to ensure their well-being should she disappear. As Doctor Rank slowly dies throughout the show, the shell of Nora's wooden doll simultaneously disintegrates and decays. But in Nora's case a new autonomous woman is born. As a last resort, Nora attempts to use her sexual prowess to get money from Rank. Her grave moral lapses encourage Rank to admit his embarrassing declaration of love for her. A sense of darkness penetrates the scene and Nora is involved in the fight between the doll and the woman. Her old self, the doll, would continue to play the role of seductress, acquire the money, and use Dr. Rank as she pleased. Yet, in this decisive moment, Nora's newfound morality wins out: "Bring the lamp," she orders the maid (40). Invoking the light, Nora wishes for the cheerful atmosphere of the dollhouse to be restored. However, the dramatic effect of the request for light highlights the fact that Nora has a sudden insight into the darkness and ugliness of the dolls. Her illusions are dispelled by a self-awareness and willpower that has long been missing from her doll persona. Realizing the evil within the dollhouse and within herself, Nora decides to put an end to the world of dolls. For her, however, the opposite of dollydom is death, the dollhouse is all she knows. Nora decides that her Tarantella dance will be her last performancemortal, as he sees the end of the party not only as the end of his marriage, but also the last moments of his life. The scene in which the dance is practiced has a lot of underlying meaning. Nora wants Torvald's full attention to keep her thoughts away from Krogstad's ruinous note in the letterbox. In many ways, his life hangs by a thread: HELMER: My dear dear Nora, you're dancing like your life depends on it. NORA: That's right. (47)Leila tarantella is also a symbolic death dance that Rank, appropriately, plays for her on the piano. Her frenetic, frenetic movements symbolize the vortex in which she is trapped. Right at the epicenter, however, the dying doll finally abandons herself, albeit to chaos, desperation and uncertainty, so that the woman can emerge. In this way the tarantella embodies the loss and reconquest of its identity. The real question, however, is whether or not Nora will resort to suicide. Rank appears again at the beginning of Act III, and both he and Nora know, or at least think, that they will soon die:NORA: Sleep well, Doctor Rank.RANK: Thank you for this wish.NORA: Wish me the same.RANK: You? Well, if you want... sleep well. And thanks for the light. (57) Nora learned from Dr. Rank's stoic acceptance of necessity how to face death without hysteria. These two reflect on each other one last time, as Nora lights his cigar. Metaphorically, this moment “revives the poignant memory of what each has lost in the other…the sustaining fire, the light, the ardor of a joyful life” (Durbach 89). One last illusion remains before Nora can fully commit to her. decision. The “wonderful thing,” as she calls it, will confirm her belief that “when the world falls apart, Torvald will remain a pillar of selfless sacrifice and prove a man worthy of dying” (64). Throughout the course of the show, he constantly treats her like a child, especially through his tiny language and controlling mentality towards her. For years he played the role of the doll, his "lark" and the "squirrel", to make his wishes come true. Because of this manipulation, Nora is convinced that Torvald will bear the brunt of the blame when the dollhouse collapses. “I have often wished that you might be threatened by some great danger,” he states, “so that I might risk my life's blood and all for your sake” (Ibsen 58). As the male puppet of the house, Torvald, like Nora, has come to believe in the doll's identity so resolutely that the idea supersedes the reality. Torvald's reaction to the realization of his wife's deception, although not expected by Nora, is expected by the audience. . He falls apart in the last fifteen minutes of the show, wondering how the accident will reflect on him. After Krogstad's apology, Torvald's attitude changes dramatically and he tells Nora that although they can no longer be the loving couple they once were, they should remain together to maintain the appearance of a happy family life. Nora, in her latest epiphanic experience, realizes what the public has always understood, that independence is necessary to free oneself from the world of fantasy and false romantic expectations that the dollhouse represents. He recognizes that all his tastes and beliefs derive from Torvald or his father. Torvald, although sometimes unbearable, is the only real support in her life. When the male doll shatters, it is absolutely unbearable for her. Rather than remain part of a marriage based on an intolerable lie, Nora chooses to leave her home and discover for herself the individuality she has long been denied. Only an innocent creature can brave the dangers of the outside world to find the, 1958. 3-68.
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