A Doll's House - Ibsen (Theme of Hereditary)
A2 ENGLISH LITERATURE
A DOLL’S HOUSE
Ibsen’s drama revolves around the central idea of men and women striving to realize their full potential while being prevented from doing so by the facts of their circumstances.
How far do you agree with this statement?
A Doll’s House was first published in 1879 and was a sensational success in Scandinavia and Germany, running through three editions within three months. However it wasn’t as successful in the likes of England as its plot and the themes it explored were controversial as the class divisions that had been abandoned in Scandinavia still existed in Britain. The play was written after Charles Darwin had written Origin of Species (1859) and this had caused a huge debate within the intellectual world about the theory of evolution, a debate which affected Ibsen’s thinking also. The notion that man has evolved according to laws of natural selection, and survival of the fittest, which places him in a hereditary sequence has led to demands of heredity being an important theme in A Doll’s House running alongside that of free will. This theme is also one of significance to Ibsen’s own life as at the age of six Ibsen was subjected to hearing rumours that he was the product of an affair on his mother’s behalf – rumours that he did not reject despite his strong resemblance to his father. In 1885 Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson (a popular leader, journalist, novelist, director and theatre manager as well as a dramatist) wrote in a newspaper article: “People are delving more deeply into human nature from every angle, in science as well as in art. We investigate each minutest trait, we dissect and analyse … and in art this current of naturalism reveals itself in theatrical terms in a strong demand for individualization.”
Ibsen was writing in a time of transition from the grandeur of romanticism and the French well-made play, developed by Eugene Scribe, to the more naturalistic mode of performance and as Bjoernson pointed out
A DOLL’S HOUSE
Ibsen’s drama revolves around the central idea of men and women striving to realize their full potential while being prevented from doing so by the facts of their circumstances.
How far do you agree with this statement?
A Doll’s House was first published in 1879 and was a sensational success in Scandinavia and Germany, running through three editions within three months. However it wasn’t as successful in the likes of England as its plot and the themes it explored were controversial as the class divisions that had been abandoned in Scandinavia still existed in Britain. The play was written after Charles Darwin had written Origin of Species (1859) and this had caused a huge debate within the intellectual world about the theory of evolution, a debate which affected Ibsen’s thinking also. The notion that man has evolved according to laws of natural selection, and survival of the fittest, which places him in a hereditary sequence has led to demands of heredity being an important theme in A Doll’s House running alongside that of free will. This theme is also one of significance to Ibsen’s own life as at the age of six Ibsen was subjected to hearing rumours that he was the product of an affair on his mother’s behalf – rumours that he did not reject despite his strong resemblance to his father. In 1885 Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson (a popular leader, journalist, novelist, director and theatre manager as well as a dramatist) wrote in a newspaper article: “People are delving more deeply into human nature from every angle, in science as well as in art. We investigate each minutest trait, we dissect and analyse … and in art this current of naturalism reveals itself in theatrical terms in a strong demand for individualization.”
Ibsen was writing in a time of transition from the grandeur of romanticism and the French well-made play, developed by Eugene Scribe, to the more naturalistic mode of performance and as Bjoernson pointed out