A Doll's House Essay

The Play “A Doll's House” is a naturalistic play based on the social reality of the European society in the late nineteenth century. It deals with the problem of traditional marriage based on domination of women by men and women's position as possession of man. The society at that time was very subjugated and women were not given enough respect at that time .There were no independent women at that time and the institution of marriage was considered as sacrosanct and women could not leave her husband. The play, which questions these traditional attitudes of the society, was very controversial and had elicited widespread criticism at that time. In fact, when the play was first staged, the audience was not happy with the play because it was women-centric,

Krogstad is a low-level employee who works in the bank where Torvald works. Throughout most of the play it seems that Krogstad cares more about his reputation than anything else. Punished by society for his act of forgery, he is desperate to reclaim respectability in the eyes of others which forces Krogstad to blackmail Nora. In a similar way to Nora, Krogstad learns that society’s view of him is meaningless if he doesn’t respect himself as an individual .His conversation with Mrs Linden in the third act makes him realize that he will only achieve happiness by reforming himself and achieving the personal integrity that he lost rather than gaining the outward respectability. Mrs Linden too has faced many difficulties due to the hostile nature of the society against women as she was forced into a loveless marriage to take care of her brothers and her elderly mother, as she could not have lived an independent life in that time as women were not allowed to work and were treated unequally with the men. In those times, the society considered that a women should be married off to a man she barely knew and such was the case in the relationship between Nora and Torvald which is between two ordinary people who lack awareness of themselves and have differing views of right and wrong. Torvald is an ordinary man but his actions are influenced by society which makes him a