The Treatment of Women in a Streetcar Named Desire and a Doll House

Odile H
Mrs. Lockman
English
26 April 2013 The Treatment of Women in A Streetcar Named Desire and A Doll House
Although A Streetcar Named Desire (ASND) by Tennessee Williams, and A Doll House (ADH) by Henrik Ibsen are written nearly a hundred years apart, both authors have men treat women in similar fashion. Both men, Mitch from ASND and Torvald from ADH, treat women as if women are their possession, they get very angry at the women for not following the rules and finally, as a consequence of not following rules they ruin the man’s reputation.
The first treatment of women would be possession. In the plays, both men want the women for themselves. A man having an idea that a woman is their possession is evident in both plays. In ASND, Mitch and Blanche have gone on their date and after some awkward remarks, Mitch tells Blanche, “You need somebody. And I need somebody too. Could it be you and me Blanche?” (Williams 116). This quote obviously shows that Mitch really adores Blanche. Although Mitch does not know about Blanche’s past life at this point, he does know that Blanche is really looking for love. Blanche has a weakness of doing anything to achieve love. What Mitch has done is used Blanche’s weakness to his advantage. He has proclaimed his love with Blanche, having Blanche agree right away, making Blanche a possession to Mitch. This similarly happens to Nora and Torvald in ADH. In ADH, Nora has made one of the biggest commitment as Torvald’s possession by marrying him. After Torvald and Nora comes back from the costume party, Torvald tries to put on an intimate mood, but Nora did not want that. Nora is more concerned about the possibility of leaving Torvald, and tries to ignore his intimate cutes. Torvald is confused and asks, “Am I not to look at my most precious possession? All that loveliness that is mine, nobody’s but mine, all of it mine” (Ibsen, 942). Evidently, this quote shows that Torvald treats Nora as if she is an object that he must protect. This also shows male dominance in Torvald. During this time period, women are limited to what they were allowed to do, unless they are given consent from their husbands. This idea has brought up the notion of men being dominant over women. Although both plays is staged in two different time periods, the idea still is present. For Mitch, it’s possessing Blanche by controlling her by her weaknesses, but for Torvald, it is making sure that Nora knows that Torvald is the only one allowed to make up the rules. For both men, it is about making sure that both women follow the rules, but if they don’t follow them, big consequences will follow. The second treatment that both women endure from the men is rage. Although both stories are different there is still the similarity that both Blanche and Now are keeping a secret. For Blanche, it is of her past life, while for Nora, it is about he bargaining for money without her husband’s consent. Both secrets have been kept from their loved ones, but they can not be kept a secret for long. Mitch really adores Blanche, he believes she is an innocent, talkative, middle aged women who have had some difficult times in her life. Mitch has no idea that Blanche has had an affair with a student, lost her family’s estate, and sold herself to men at a hotel. Mitch is quite upset at Blanche telling her that she lied to Mitch (Williams 147), all about her past life and how much she lies about who she is not. Mitch’s ideas about Blanche has changed completely. After hearing about what Blanche has been hiding from Mitch, Mitch leaves her. It is not surprising that Mitch would be upset at her, but he should not have been so upset that he would leave her. Even though Blanche has made some bad decisions, if Mitch really adores her as much as he tells her, he should still be reasonable and still care for her despite her mistakes. Similar to Blanche, Nora have done some things that she does not want anyone to know especially her lover Torvald. The thing that is different between Nora and Blanche is the guilt; Blanche feels the most guilty for what she has done, but Nora does not feel guilty at all, if anything, she is unaware that she done anything bad in the first place. However, as the play and Nora’s secret start to unravel, Nora starts to before frantic that Torvald will find out about her dark secret, but then one evening he does. After Torvald reads the letter, sent by Krogstad, he starts screaming awful things at Nora, “You have ruined all my happiness” (Ibsen 946). During this time period, women were not allowed to do anything without a husband’s consent. Since Nora borrowed money without Torvald’s consent, she has done an illegal thing. Like Mitch, it’s understandable that Torvald would get upset at her, but Torvald always claims that he loves her as well. If Torvald loved Nora as much as he shows, then he should try to calm down and try to understand Nora’s side of the story. However, Torvald kept insulting Nora and not allowing her to speak. Both men believe that when women are not as they seem or do not follow the rules, men will be angry. The men will be angry partly because of what the women have done, but also because the women are ruining the men’s reputations as well. Both men is the plays show signs of reputations that they must keep, however, both women are keeping them from obtaining that reputation that both men must keep. In ASND, Mitch has always wanted to bring Blanche home to visit his mother. He just wants to prove to his mother that there is closure for Mitch by marrying Blanche. However, after hearing about Blanche’s past he thinks that Blanche is, “not clean enough to bring in the house of [Mitch’s] mother” (Williams, 150). The reason he does not want to bring Blanche to visit his mother is partly due to Blanche’s past life, but also due to the fact that Mitch will be ashamed of bringing home like Blanche’s past life that will lower his reputation because she is ‘not clean enough’. Torvald also thinks that keeping up reputations are essentially, especially considering he is being promoted to a higher job in the bank. After Torvald finds out what Nora has done, he does get very angry at Nora but only because she has ruined his reputation, “It’s not a question of happiness any more but of hanging on to what can be salvaged - pieces, appearances” (Ibsen 946). Shortly after, the maid gives a letter to Torvald, which states that Krogstad will stop blackmailing Nora. This made Torvald very happy, forgetting that he was being angry at Nora and forgiving Nora completely about what she has done, “You can’t make yourself believe that I have forgiven you. But I have, Nora; I swear to you, I have forgiven you for everything.” (Ibsen 947). Once has has forgiven her, Torvald starts complimenting her as if nothing has happened. The first quote shows that what Torvald believes is valuable are his possessions and appearances, essentially his reputation. Torvald believes that since Nora has done such a terrible thing, it will ruin all his most valuable possession, his reputation. However, after Torvald receives the letter from Krogstad, he flips his emotions completely and starts complementing Nora, because his reputation has been saved. It’s quite strange to see two completely opposite emotions that are nearly a lines from each other, but the two quotes say a lot about how much Torvald values his reputation. These two examples show that both men value their reputation more than they value women.
There are many differences between Nora and Blanche, their social status, their relationship status, and their wealth. However, the way that men treat both women are very similar. Both Mitch and Torvald treat women as if they are their possession by proclaiming their love, they are allowed to be enraged at women despite what the men have said about loving their women, and that the men are more worried about ruining their reputation than the woman’s.