Research Paper On A Doll's House By Henrik Ibsen

“I say what I want to say and do what I want to do. There's no in between. People will either love you for it or hate you for it.”.Nora the protagonist of “ A Doll’s House” struggles to find her independence during a time in which women were inferior to men. The victorian age imposed expectations and responsibilities for women. Women were supposed to be subjected to their husband and care for their kids. Literature was a way to send a message that something isn’t okay, society’s ranking of women then led to Henrik Ibsen to create “ A Doll’s House”. Henrik Ibsen uses the play “ A Doll's House” to show and critique society’s expectations of women, society, and issues with the upper class during the victorian age.

Don’t live by the world’s expectations. The play states in act two “Surely you can understand that being with Torvald is a little like being with papa." . In the quote you have Nora who is comparing living with Torvald to being with her father. We know in the play that Torvald has obsolete control over Nora and everything she does. Nora compares life with Torvald to that of her father because Nora’s father was just like how Torvald is in the play both men don’t trust females with money, which is why Nora had to forge her father's signature By Torvald
calling her pet names like “Little squirrel” Nora is being chained by the rule of Torvald , Ibsen is criticizing society in that time by showing Torvald's overwhelming power and control over Nora. This can also be seen in the way that women are weakened by society. Ibsen highlights and criticizes the way that the male figure is so dominant in marriage and how the woman does not have much of a role in society.

The Victorian age was a point of time when women could not do anything for herself. An example of this from the play is when Nora forges her father's signature in order to take a out a loan to save Torvald's life which was in grave danger. Nora could not take out the loan herself due to the fact that she was a woman and the men handled all of the money, a women could only take out a loan if they had the consent of a husband or a father. Ibsen mocks society by the fact that even though Nora was doing this to save the life of her husband she not only was not permitted to do it but then Torvald found out he was not happy she saved his life but rather mad about the ripple effects of Nora’s actions that could possibly ruin his reputation in his job and in society. The mockery of the play shows the miniscule role of women in society by saying that Torvald would have rather died than have a women save him.

During this time of age the only thing that matters to people is how they are portrayed. In the play the most important thing to the upper class of society is how others portray you, A scenario in the play occurs and Torvald was left with a decision, his family or his reputation. Even though Nora had been very loyal to him for the years of their marriage but when Torvald could be a good husband to Nora by defending her he was more concerned with making sure the incident would be kept a secret in order to preserve his reputation . Ibsen is criticizing society in this situation because of the incorrect approaches of the upper class in dealing with this sort of problem.

In conclusion, Ibsen uses “A doll's House” to criticize and address the problems with society in regards to expectation of the people and the role of women and how powerless and excluded they were from society during the Victorian age.
Ibsen also mocks the ways of the upper class, by showing the unbalanced marriages in which only one half of the relationship is truly committed while the other half is only there half way. Finally even though it was probably only the upper class that were being criticized, mainly because the whole play connected to one thing and that is that the upper class might seem like they are living in a doll's house but in reality the only thing found in the household is
division.