A Doll's House - Nora
At the beginning of the play, Nora, who in A Doll's House is the female protagonist, is portrayed like a doll, hence the title of the play. Her husband, Torvald, talks to her like a little girl, using terms such as "little lark" or "little squirrel" or his "song bird" in ways that illustrate his dominance in their relationship. He also makes her seem inferior by making parallels to weak diminutive birds and she. Later on in the first act, we are shown that Nora is not really as helpless as she is first revealed. Throughout the story Nora struggles for self-realization and independence from Torvald's childlike treatment of her. Nora's gradual self-realization is depicted thoroughly in A Doll's House. The play flows well with the theme of self-realization in women. Although the characters in books or short stories such as "The Color Purple" or "A Work of Artifice" are in totally different situations, they all deal with the same grapple; that is, the search for a full appreciation of themselves. Throughout the story we are enlightened by the fact that Nora really isn't as inferior, or a "silly girl" like Torvald believes she is. In Act One through Nora's conversation with Mrs. Linde, we are revealed that she has made
Nora also has a lot in common with the main female in Charlotte Perkins Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper." Like the woman in this short story, Nora was "locked up". Contrasting the main female character in "The Yellow Wallpaper" Nora was not really trapped, but the false life and identity she had assumed in her own house served to be that of an internment. The whole story, up until the formal dinner, takes place inside the walls of her house. The reader is given birdlike images, throughout Torvald's terms used to refer to Nora, leading the reader to believe that she is confined to the walls of her own house, proving to be sort of like a cage for Nora, the bird. Through Nora's excitement to wear the fancy party dress, the reader is given a foreshadowing of her urge to set free, and be independent. The poem "A Work of Artifice" is a precise example of how Nora acted, and was treated before her self-realization. The poem is about a bonsai tree, which is used as a symbol for a woman, and used to depict the potential that a woman has, but because of man's restraint, how women are not capable to live up to that potential. Like the gardener in Piercy's poem does to the bonsai tree, Torvald "whittles back" Nora's privileges. In the opening scene Torvald forbids Nora from eating macaroons, taking away some of her rights. "It is your nature t
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Approximate Word count = 910
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)
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