Nora's Macaroons Analysis

The evolution of the relationship between Nora and Torvald throughout the play
We see the imbalance of power in the relationship between Nora and Torvald in their first interaction: Nora sneaks macaroons into her mouth, and as soon as Torvald walks into the room Nora’s instinctive reaction is to put the bag of macaroons into her pocket and wipe her mouth. The guilty, almost child-like response outlines her fear of Torvald while also portraying her feelings of restraint. Although macaroons only emerge twice in the play, they appear during moments of clear defiance to Torvald’s authority. While this literary technique highlights Nora’s lack of independence, it also reveals that macaroons are a symbol for her insubordination towards male superiority.
At this point it becomes clear to Nora that “she had been living all these years with a strange man, and she had born him three children”. This realization forces Nora to evaluate her entire relationship with Torvald and puts everything into perspective for her. At the end of the above statement, she adds “Oh, I cannot bear to think of it!” which reflects her childish shutting out of unsavoury thoughts. It isn’t simply the fact that Torvald valued his reputation over their marriage that opens Nora’s eyes to reality. She didn’t understand that whilst Torvald loved her, he loved her as a possession - a status symbol. Nora serves the role of a wife and mother, but not of equal. Torvald planned to cope with the scandal dealt to him by the blackmail by stripping Nora of her spousal and motherly duties, but would keep her in the house for appearance’s sake, almost as a facade. In both their minds, if Nora, with her character tainted as a criminal, would poison
The next thing Nora does is change out of her fancy dress. Torvald had bought this dress for Nora to wear at the costume party because it was his wish that she appear as a "Neapolitan fish girl". As one would put clothes on a doll, Torvald adorns her with decorative clothing. When she sheds the dress, she is discarding a symbol of her doll-like existence. Nora then seats Torvald at the table and explains her situation to him. She does not let him speak until she has said all she wants to say. At the table, Torvald is still wearing the clothes he wore to the fancy dress party. This was a deliberate move by Ibsen: like the fish girl dress, these clothes are artificial; they are a costume and in the current setting, Torvald is put in a role where the attire is inappropriate and his "dollness" becomes evident. When Nora comes to the realization that her character was but a medley of societal expectations, she also recognizes that the honourable, trustworthy, principled husband she thought she was married to was merely a character formed out of her own lofty expectations. Their marriage was a doll marriage: he a