Henrik Ibsen was not your ordinary 19th-century playwright. He was a rebel in the field of theatre bringing in a new direction theatre would take hence making him one of the most recognisable Norwegian playwright. The themes discussed below deviate from major themes that have been explored by other writers. In this play, Henrik explores the conflict between humanity and society. The following are themes from the play.
- Appearance versus reality
Henrik Ibsen cleverly plays out contrasts in this play. What we see from the outset, is not exactly as it seems. From the beginning, the house of the Helmer’s seems progressive, happy and respectable. However, beneath the veneer of all the happiness, there are hidden secrets and sacrifices.
Nora can be seen as a naïve, playful woman with little care in the world. Her role throughout the play is that of a mother and chief decision-maker in the affairs of the house. Nevertheless, we come to see a mature Nora who sacrifices for her family and love. She confesses to Mrs Linde that she took a loan for the in order to save her husband who had been diagnosed by a fatal disease. It is a well-kept secret that even her husband does not know. In order to pay up the loan, Nora has to plays spendthrift yet spends nothing on herself.
Besides the sacrifice, Nora grows into an independent woman. She realizes that her spineless husband is not worth her salt and walks away. Helmer is shocked at the turn of events. Nora, as a girl living under the shadow of her father and later as a woman under the shadow of her husband, had never known her true self and being independent. However, towards the end of the play, she is ready and willing to ditch all this security and take on the vicissitudes of the world. She is no longer naïve and weak as we saw her earlier in the play. She is a lioness.
Helmer, on the other hand, plays the role of a protective loving husband. However, when he reads Krogstad’s letter; he folds like a deflated ball and cringes at the fear of being shamed. Helmer’s turn-about shocks Nora. She had hoped that all she had sacrificed, Helmer would stand by her and protect her from Krogstad’s intimidation. Despite playing a loving, devoted and generous husband, Helmer was indeed a shallow empty man only concerned with his public reputation.
Another character, Krogstad comes of bitter, vengeful extortionist whose only interest is fighting for individual gain. However, when he is reunited with his love- Mrs Linde, he becomes a forgiving and generous man. He even forgives Nora’s transgressions to the relief of Helmer.
Finally, Mrs Linde we are introduced to is independent and self-sufficient until we learn of her misfortunes. In fact, she had come back to town solely with the purpose of looking for a job.
- Respect and reputation
In Victorian society, a society within which the play is set, people believed in being respectable and honourable. Within this constructs, Torvald would do anything to safeguard his reputation including bending to the whims of Krogstad.
The biggest irony in A Doll’s House is that the play takes place in the living room of Torvald Helmer but, the men in the play are constantly haunted by their public image. In A Doll’s House, one’s standing in the society transcends family.
Having been promoted to a bank manager, Helmer plans to fire Krogstad because of his tainted reputation. Helmer is afraid that associating with such characters would ruin his reputation.
Krogstad, on the other hand, plans to redeem himself through the Helmers. On learning that he is to be dismissed, he digs up old dirt on Nora and plans to use it to his advantage. At first, he had planned just to extort from Nora using her forgery as a yardstick. Realizing that extortion won’t work, he pulls out the big gun. He plans to reveal Nora’s forgery to her husband and threaten to release it to the public unless the Helmer’s agree to his demands. This scares Nora. As things stand, Nora is more afraid of ruining her husband’s reputation than death. Like cancer, she is ready to cut ties with her husband for the sake of his reputation. On the other hand, when Helmer learns of Nora’s forgery, he is horrified and quickly switches to survival mode. He is ready to do anything to appease Krogstad than have his name disgraced.
As can be seen in the play, the members of A Doll’s house are keen on individual reputation and respect. Lack of these two virtues is considered as a contagious disease. Helmer believes that Krogstad’s children will be poisoned by their father’s crimes. In this respect, Helmer forbids Nora from raising their children after he learns about Nora’s transgressions in the letter.
Helmer also faces another agonizing situation. He knows his wife committed a crime. Given his good reputation and moral standing in society, he cannot live with such a disgraceful person in the house. But he cannot also separate with his wife since that would be more humiliating than the forgery. Therefore, the only way is to let Nora act as his official wife for the sake of their public image.
- The Role of Women
Women’s roles have always been in the shadows of men hence the saying, ‘behind every successful man, there is a woman.’ Going by this trend, women have always been overlooked in major decision making. To this day, America has had over 40 presidents but none is a woman.
Henrik Ibsen believed that women have the responsibility to develop their individuality; nevertheless, their role has always been self-sacrificial. In society, women have never been seen as equals in their contribution to family and society. This is the reason why Helmer finds it absurd that his wife can advise him not to fire Krogstad. He believes that it is embarrassing to kowtow before one’s wife. It will taint his image.
Women did not have the authority to conduct business or transact in their own money. When Helmer fall’s sick, Nora is devastated. On the one hand, her husband is afraid of debts and according to the doctor, really needs a holiday to get better. On the other hand, her father is very sick and on the verge of dying. Yet she needs to save her husband for the sake of her children. Having no other male relative, Nora forges her father’s signature and secures the loan necessary for her husband’s treatment.
Just like many other women, Nora had not had a decent education and did not really understand the implications of her forgery until when Krogstad pointed it to her. According to her, she thought she could get away with forgery. She was wrong.
Nora envies Mrs Linde’s freedom. Such women had the opportunity to get jobs and their money did not go to their husbands. Nonetheless, opportunities open for women had limited freedom and the pay was extremely low. Women were offered jobs like clerical work, a domestic worker and teaching. Such jobs did not offer intelligent women opportunities to exploit their potential fully.
Women characters in the play are sacrificial lambs for their families. Mrs Linde was in love with Krogstad, but she chose to marry a rich guy in order to provide for her mother and her two brothers. Nora’s forgery was to protect her ailing father and at the same time secure her husband’s health. Nora’s Nurse has to leave her own children in order to look for a low-paying job for their own sake. Interestingly, the nurse considers herself lucky for getting a job yet she got her child out of wedlock. In this society, women were indicted for getting children out of wedlock as if they were Virgin Mary!
The play does not as much offer solutions to women’s trepidation; however, Nora’s realization that she is not part of her society is a glimmer of hope to women outside there. Nora realises that marriage is a trap and the only way she can regain her own identity is to let go of her children and begin the journey of self-realization. As an independent woman maybe she could equal and maybe rival men in their thinking and setting up standards that run the society.
- Marriage
Marriage is one of the most celebrated unions in the world. Similarly, it enjoys such high moral ground in religious and many cultural circles. In A Doll’s House, Henrik Ibsen explores this vital part of the society in the life and times of Nora, her husband Torvald Helmer and other characters.
From the onset, marriage seems a happy association since Nora is jubilant and bubbly as a wife. Although money could be one of the factors that threaten this marriage, Nora is capable of handling it. Torvald is very particular about the family’s expenditure and warns Nora to be careful. Being naïve and playing innocence helps Norah to get away with her husband’s restraint.
In their association, Helmer holds the high moral ground, chief financier and key decision-maker. He feels it a weakness to take advice from a woman. This makes him stand ground on his decision to fire Krogstad.
Mrs Linde’s marriage, on the other hand, was a marriage of convenience. She was in love with Krogstad, but she decided to marry a man of means because she needed to help her mother and two brothers financially. According to her, the chances of Krogstad making it in life were hopeless at the time. Anyway, when the man she married dies, she is free to reunite with her former love.
Marriage is a union of two like-minded individuals. As seen in the play, Krogstad settles down when he meets Mrs Linde. In the beginning, Krogstad was a bitter vengeful person, but when he meets Mrs Linde, he is ready to forgive anything. In fact, he is ready to ask Helmer for his letter back but Mrs Linde dissuades him from doing so.
According to Mrs Linde, a good union should be built on mutual trust with no secrets. The fact that Nora has kept such a secret from her husband shows that their marriage is built on falsehood. If Nora’s marriage is to work, she should reveal her true self to her husband.
This does not actually work for Nora. Indeed, Nora’s union was a meeting of unlike-minded individuals. Whereas Nora was a free-spirited risk-taker, Helmer was rigid and callous with an outward look at the society. Although at the beginning their marriage worked, it was just a time bomb waiting to explode.
Henrik brings an interesting conversation around marriage in this play. Firstly, there is the question of why we get married as seen in Mrs Linde’s marriages. And then there is the question of compatibility; not only physical but mental and in a way spiritual. Matrimony is a meeting of like minds for it to work and that is why Helmer’s family breaks apart.
- Money
Money can be many things. It is one of the reasons as to why this most loved commodity has become a human being’s obsession. Henrik Ibsen, in A Doll’s House, looks at how money has enslaved human being and in some occasions made them behave insane or docile depending on an individual’s disposition.
In A Doll’s House, Nora seems to be in need of an endless supply of money to make the cogs of her house go by. Being a Christmas season, Nora wants the festivities to be flawless and that is why she goes overboard with her shopping. Helmer asks her whether she has been overspending and her answer is, this was their first Christmas that they needed not to worry about money after Helmer’s big promotion (pg2). In this respect, Helmer is sceptical about Nora’s grasp on basic financing. According to Helmer, they should have waited until the new appointment had come into effect before overspending. However, Nora is of the opinion that it should be sooner rather than later.
When we observe Helmer’s mannerisms and conduct, he is more conservative with the use of money. With him, one is supposed to live within one’s means. He does not share Nora’s view that even if they ran out of cash they could borrow. Nora is the direct contrast of Helmer. She is unafraid of being in debt and when Helmer cautions her about it asking what she would do in case he died immediately after he had borrowed, she says she needn’t worry about the debt anymore since the debtor had already died.
Nora’s carefree spirit sees her secure a huge loan from Krogstad behind her husband’s back. It was not for the want of a good life but for the life of her husband. Helmer had been seriously ill and the doctor had recommended they head South where the weather was tolerable. Knowing Helmer’s fear of loans, Nora took it upon herself to rescue her husband by securing a loan.
The payment of loan proves to be a difficult task for Nora. Since she keeps it as a secret from her husband, Nora has to salvage the little from housekeeping and what Helmer gives her for wardrobe to pay it. Although everything is fine, changes in the bank threaten her secret.
When Helmer is promoted as a bank manager, he threatens to fire Krogstad a man to whom Nora owes a great deal. Krogstad on learning of his imminent dismissal threatens to tell on Nora if she doesn’t stop her husband from firing him. Nora would have been okay with the secret being let out but for the little misdemeanour- she had committed forgery in order to secure the loan.
Apparently, Nora and Krogstad were to peas in the pod; they both had committed forgery. Krogstad had been disgraced in the society and the dismissal was a final blow to his career and standing in society. Nora, on the other hand, had been living on borrowed time.
Nora understands her husband well. He cannot be swayed by his wife’s petitions and truly Helmer refuses flatfooted to reconsider Krogstad’s situation. Armed with a letter, however, Krogstad is determined to destroy the Helmers.
When Helmer learns of Nora’s treachery, he is ready to submit to Krogstad’s demands. He issues edicts to which Nora has to abide. However, Krogstad under the persuasion of Mrs Linde decides not to punish the Helmers. Just as the bad news had thrown him into tantrums, the news of Krogstad’s forgiveness drives Helmer into a frenzied celebration. Upon which Nora makes a decision to stand for herself if her husband doesn’t.
It is money that drives the health and wealth of the society and it is also the same money that tears apart a tight-knit relationship between Helmer and his wife. Without money, one cannot sustain themselves as seen in Mrs Linde’s situation. She had married to safeguard her family from poverty but the death of her rich husband had left her a pauper.
Ibsen seems to compel society to revolve around the need for money. Whereas some are fearless and risk a lot to obtain it, others like Helmer are too careful that they are ready to die with a good name than risk the ridicule of society.
- Morality
Morality can be many things. However, it basically guides what is regarded as right or wrong. Right or wrong is subjective to the individual, communal or societal beliefs at a particular time, within particular constructs. For instance, gayism/homosexuality was considered a moral wrong within so many societies and nowadays, it is slowly becoming a recognized social norm. Similarly, some communities in Africa and Asia practised and some still practise Female Genital Mutilation. Girls who did not undergo such rites were chastised and to some extent could not get a husband. However, such considerations are slowly losing ground as new philosophies around morality are formulated.
The community within A Doll’s House has its own moral rules which are to be followed by every individual. It is within this moral confine that Nora is caught. The society is such rigid that it considers Nora’s sole act of heroism as untoward. Nora’s act of forgery was mainly because she had nowhere to turn at the time her husband needed her. Her father having passed on, she had no male relative to sign an affidavit that will help her secure a loan.
Nora wonders why society would judge and ostracize someone for taking a desperate measure on behalf of their loved ones. As part of her self-discovery, Nora hopes to prove whether she or it is the society was wrong. She is embittered by the way the society treats those who do not follow rules. The truth about the matter dawns on her when Torvald, the representative of ‘the moral code’ states clearly the facts of the matter and how Nora is to conduct herself henceforth.
Another victim of morality is Krogstad. Although he was a fine lawyer and exceptional employee, his misdeeds make him a social pariah. Moral disciples like Torvald cut links with him. In fact, on being promoted Torvald dismisses Krogstad hence stirring the events that compel Nora to leave her husband. Krogstad opens Nora’s eyes to exactly what should happen to her and family if in case whatever she had done is exposed to the limelight.
Other characters who come in the play at the same time are Mrs Linde and Dr Rank. Mrs Linde had broken her relationship with Krogstad so that she could marry for money and security. On the other hand, Dr Rank is hopelessly in love with Nora. As can be observed, Ibsen was satirizing the society within which the play is set. Despite the clear cut image of what is considered right, most of its followers were imperfect except for Helmer.
- Inheritance
A Doll’s House looks at various aspects of inheritance. Most often, inheritance is looked under the concept of coming into material wealth left behind by a dead relative. Banking on material inheritance, Nora lies to Torvald that the money she had used for their trip down south was part of her inheritance from her dead father.
By the end of the 19th century, there was a growing interest in genetic science. However, society’s understanding of this science was not as conclusive as it is today. Therefore, there were a lot of misconceptions on what could be passed on from one generation to another.
Among the misconceived notions was that moral decadence could be inherited. Dr Rank suffers from a strange illness which he believes he inherited from his father who led a promiscuous life. When Nora learns about her own immoral conduct, she begins to distance herself from her children. She believes that she will poison her children with whatever disease she currently has. To reinforce her predicament, Torvald sets the terms of their new arrangements and forbids Nora (pg105) from bringing up the children. In fact, Torvald believes that Krogstad will poison his own children with his own moral crimes.
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