Feminism in Doll’s House Essay

One of the primary tenets of Marxism is the article of belief that hu homosexual thought is a product of the individuals genial and economic conditions, their relationships with former(a)s be oft undermined by those conditions (Letterbie 1259), and that the weak or less-fortunate are al federal agencys exploited by the richer bourgeoisie. A common national found in Henrik Ibsens piddle, A Dolls House, is the exploitation of the weak and the poor by the strong and the rich, and an arrested development with genuine possession.The characters in A Dolls House are all affected by the lack or learning of bills, and their entire lives and way of thinking are base upon it. Therefore, a Marxist proposition pervades throughout much of the play and fork over be seen from each of the main characters perspectives. Noras way of thinking and her outlook on doings are both completely dominated by her material wealth and pecuniary conditions. For example, when the play begins Nora is just returning home from a shopping trip.She enters the apartment with an armload of packages (43) and is followed by a boy carrying a Christmas tree. Nora then tells Helene, one of their maids, to hide the tree so the kids wont see it until its been decorated. When Torvald enters, she asks him for bullion so she clear hang the bills in gilt paper as Christmas tree decorations (45). The tree symbolizes her obsession with money because she didnt want anyone to see it until it had been decorated to show take out their youngfound wealth.Previously, she made the decorations by hand, sp fetch uping an entire day on the project. Doing the equivalent now would be thinking poor in her mind, so she spends excessive amounts of money on presents and decorates the tree with it because now they can afford to let themselves go a bit (44). Now that Nora belongs to a high social severalise she a great deal throws money away. She tells the tree delivery boy to keep the change from the cr p rofess she gave him, rendering him twice what he asks.Despite the fact that Torvalds sneak wont come into effect for another(prenominal) three months, she insists that we can borrow until then (44) when previously she and Torvald saved every penny they could in dedicate to get by, and they both worked odd jobs in localise to supplement their income. She becomes more selfish as wellhead, considering that if something were to breathe to Torvald after they had borrowed money, it just wouldnt matter (44) because the masses they borrowed from are strangers. Now that they belong to a higher social class, her responsibility has flown out the door and she contends wholly for her own interests.She doesnt bring off what would happen to the strangers she borrowed from, because she concentrates single on what she can extract from other people. Also, when her friend Kristine comes over, the first thing she mentions is her husbands new job, claiming that she feels so light and happy (49) because they now have stacks of money and not a care in the world (49). When the wiser Kristine answers that it would be nice to have enough for the necessities (50) Nora insists that that is not enough-she repeats that she wants stacks and stacks of money (50).After she tells Kristine she borrowed the money for the trip to Italy, and tells her about all the hard work she did in order to pay it off, she says her worries dont matter anymore because now Im free (56). She equates liberty with the acquisition of wealth, saying that having money is the only way she can be carefree and happy (56). By the end of the play, however, she realizes that even if she is able to be free of her debts, she is still financially enslaved to her husband, because as a woman she is completely dependant on him.She refers to leaving him as closing out their accounts, (108) and in doing so she renounces not only her marital vows but also her financial dependence because she has discovered that perso nal and human freedom are not measured in economic terms, (Letterbie 1260). Noras entire outlook on look changes with a change in her economic conditions, thereby demonstrating the Marxist belief that peoples thoughts are a product of their financial posts. Torvald is much more careful with money, but he too bases his outlook on life and relationships solely on money and the status it earns him.When he hears Nora return from shopping, he asks if his little riotous has been out throwing money near again, (44) saying that they unfeignedly cant go squandering (44). Nora claims that since Torvald kick in alone be making piles and piles of money (44) from now on they can borrow until his raise comes through, but he is adamant in his reply that they should never borrow and have no debt because something of freedom is lost from a home thats founded on borrowing and debt (44). Torvald, too, equates money with freedom, and refuses to flag up that freedom by borrowing money.He too th en mentions that it is a wonderful feeling (47) to know that ones got a safe secure job with a comfortable salary, (47) similar to Noras claim that shes now carefree and happy because of it. Torvald cares not only about money, but about his social status as well. When he finds out that Nora borrowed money from Krogstad with a forged signature, his love for her is completely erased, and he says shes ruined all his happiness (106). He cares only about his reputation, because its got to seem uniform everything is the same between us-to the outside world, at least (106).All that matters to him is saving the bits and pieces, the appearance (106). However, once Krogstad gives them the broadside and says he wont tell anyone about it, he is suddenly, magically able to love her again, because no one will know. He still cares only about himself, however, claiming Im saved, Im saved Oh, and you too (107). Nora is only an afterthought when it comes to his reputation. Their relationship is rui ned because he continues to believe in money and social status as the source of happiness, while Nora comes to realize that money is not that important.The Marxist theme can be seen in both Kristine and Krogstad as well. Kristine sacrificed her love for Krogstad and married another man because his prospects seemed pessimistic back then, (95) and she had to be able to take care of her mother and brothers. Although their relationship was revived in the end, it roughly failed simply for money (95). Once she comes back to Krogstad, she still wont even give up the job she took from him, because she has to look out for herself-she tells Nora that in her position you have to live, and so you grow selfish (52).This is a Marxist attitude because her entire life and mind-set are a result of her economic situation at the time of her decisions. Krogstad affiliated a crime in order to support his family, and when his job was be he tried to save it by every means possible-even blackmail-sayin g he would fight for it like life itself (64) if need be. Krogstad tells Nora that it was your husband who forced me to revert to my old ways, (88) but from a deeper perspective it was really his financial situation that forced his hand and made him blackmail Nora, just as it was the reason he committed a crime years before.The Helmers maid, Anna-Marie, also has a Marxist perspective on life. She had to leave her home and her child in order to get by. When Nora asks how she was able to give her child up to the care of strangers she just replies that a girl whos poor and whos gotten in trouble (73) has no other choice, and that her daughter has written to me both when she was confirmed and when she was married (73). Anna-Maries entire life as well as her way of thinking has been determined by her financial situation.Her relationship with her daughter is interrupted and practically destroyed yet she accepts her alienation from her child as if it were natural, given the circumstances of class and money (Letturbie 1260). She cant afford to be upset about leaving her only child, because she had no other choice. She had to give up a relationship with someone she loved, just as Kristine had to give up her love for Krogstad. Anna-Maries situation exemplifies that in the marketplace women were a labor force expecting subsistence wages (Letturbie 1260).Marxism includes the belief that capitalism is based on the exploitation of workers by the owners of capital. Anna-Marie may not have been exploited directly by the rich, but she is forced to live a substandard life because she is poor, and unlike Nora, she does not challenge the laws of class and alliance but accepts her situation. She does not realize that social class and societys laws were created by other people and thus are capable of imperfection and susceptible to change, (Letturbie 1260). So all she can expect is to be poor her entire life, and for her financial conditions to remain stagnant.The problems that Nora, Anna-Marie and Kristine face are compounded by their gender. Ibsens play is considered by many to be a feminist work, illustrating the erroneous treatment of the woman issue, as Ibsen called it. though he said in a speech once that Nora was supposed to represent the Everyman, and that he hadnt been trying to address the issue of womens rights, critics argue that the presence of feminism in the play is immanent and justifiable whatever Ibsens intention and in spite of his speech, (Templeton 111).Nora is depicted until the end of the play as a helpless, dimwitted fool who wastes her husbands hard earned money. She is Torvalds plaything, his burden and responsibility. Templeton describes their marriage as a pan-cultural ideala relation of superior and inferior in which the married woman is a putz of little intellectual and moral capacity, whose right and proper station is subordination to her husband (Templeton 138). Her womanly helplessness was attractive to Torvald, because he had to be in cover.When they get the Bond back from Krogstad and Torvald forgives her, he says that to a man there is something sweet and satisfying in forgiving his married woman, because it seems as if his forgiveness had made her doubly his own he has given her a new life, and she has in a way become both wife and child to him (65). She was an object, his property, to whom he deigned to give life but only for his own pleasure. During the first act, he never calls her by name he calls her his squirrel, a spendthrift, and a featherbrain, among other things.Her entire identity is determined by these nicknames while she is his squirrel she is innocent, childish, obedient, and completely dependant on him. When he finally addresses her by name, in Act Three, her appearance is entirely differentshe becomes serious, determined, and willful. She is his doll-wife, playing the game of marriage. She tells Torvald in the end, You arranged everything according to your own taste, and so I got the same tastes as you, or pretended to (67). All of it is a role that Nora has been taught to play by society, the behavior expected of all women of the time.This role was merely a mask, one that she couldnt live with in the end. On the outside, she is entirely obedient to her husband but on the inside, she yearns for recognition and a love that Torvald wasnt free to give. She was expected to be content with the life she had, though it wasnt in any way average or equal. When she expresses her hope that Torvald would have taken the blame for her crime upon himself, Torvald says that no man would ever relinquish his honor for the one he loves, and Nora replies that millions of women have done just that (70).Her rebellion was so shocking to the earreach that Ibsen was accused of a kind of godless androgyny women, in refusing to be compliant, were refusing to be women (Templeton 114). Ibsen was even forced to change this ending in order for it to be performed. Obedience was the main trait that defined women it was what disjunct them from men. When she decides to leave, Torvald claims that she is insane, because her most sacred duties were to her husband and her children, and before all else she was a wife and mother (68). So in leaving, she was in a sense denying the purpose of her existence.Women had no other role or function in society. Kristine broke free from this traditional role by chance, because her husband died. Had he lived, she would have been stuck in the same situation as Nora for the rest of her life. Even so, she is still dependant on men in order to live. When her father died, she was forced to marry a man she didnt love in order to provide for her mother and younger brothers. She wasnt able to get a job at that point, because she was young and individual so the only option she had was marriage.After her husband died and she went to visit Nora, she says I feel my life unutterably empty. No one to live for anymore (11). Her entire life u p until that point revolved around men the purpose of her existence was to please her husband and take care of her brothers. When that was no longer necessary, her life lost its meaning. She came to Nora because she was looking for work, and that could only be obtained through Torvald. When he gives her a job, he feels in control of her even outside the office.When Torvald and Nora return from the party in Act III and Kristine is there waiting, he says you really ought to embroider, its much more becoming. Let me show youin the case of knitting, that can never be anything but ungraceful (57). He presumes to instruct her on something that is traditionally womens work, and a hobby, as if she were doing it for him. He insults her taste and her work as if it is his right and his duty to correct not only his own wife but any woman that he sees doing something wrong. When Nora shut the door behind her, she wasnt just a woman leaving her family.She was a woman seeking independence from th e strictures of society and the rule of men which was located upon her because of gender. She was the representation of Everyman, illustrating the need of everyone, no matter their background, for freedom. And she was the representation of the unnoticed, underappreciated workers of the world overthrowing the capitalists who took them for granted. Ibsens play was one of the sterling(prenominal) of its time, reaching all the way to our own with a relevance that will always be effectual and true.