Links between Crime and Punishment and A Doll's House

A detailed Summary of Links between Crime and Punishment and A Doll's House

Links between Crime and Punishment and A Doll's House

There are many links between Crime and Punishment, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky and A Doll's House, by Henrik Isben. Each character goes through many ironic situations. Throughout both of the works all three types of irony are used. In this essay irony is going to be used to link the two works together. Dramatic, situational, and verbal irony are going to be used to link the two works together.

Dramatic irony is used throughout Crime and Punishment. The reader knows that Rodion Romanovitch Raskolnikov killed the pawnbroker, Alyona Ivanovna, and her sister, Lizaveta Ivanovna. A quote to support this is,

"He took the axe right out, swung it up in both hands,

barely conscious of what he was doing, and almost without effort, almost effort, almost mechanically, brought the butt of it down on the old woman's head." (Dostoyevsky 114)

No one in the novel knows who killed the pawnbroker and her sister except for Raskolnikov. The police officer, Porfiry Petrovitch, suspects that Raskolnikov killed the pawnbroker and her sister but he cannot prove it.

The reader also knows that Luzhin puts money in Sofya Semyonovna Marmeladov's pocket when she is not looking. After Sofya, whose nickname is

All three types of irony are used throughout the two works. Crime and Punishment and A Doll's House would be incomplete without irony. Irony plays an important role in any type of literature. Irony is used to help show the opposite of what is actually said and/or done. I think that without irony there would be no literature. I think that literature would be boring and plain if there was no irony to add to its originality and creativity.

Situational irony is also used throughout the two works. In Crime and Punishment Raskolnikov is the one who murdered the two sisters. It was totally unexpected when Nikolai came to the police office and said, "I'm the guilty one! The sin is mine! I'm the murderer!" (Dostoyevsky 413) The reader did not expect Nikolai to confess to the two murders because the reader knows that Raskolnikov is the one who murdered the two sisters. Porfiry did not expect Nikolai to confess either. He was positive that Raskolnikov had murdered the pawnbroker and her sister.

Raskolnikov says many ironic things throughout the novel. When he is trying to confess to Zamyotov he says, "All ears upstairs?"(Dostoyevsky 207) He really does not mean if Zamyotov's ears are physically upstairs. He is asking Zamyotov if he is listening to what he is saying. He just wants Zamyotov to listen carefully to what he is about to say.

In A Doll's House there are also examples of situational irony. An example of situational irony is when Nora leaves Torvald. There is no hint that Nora is going to leave Torvald until the end of the book. At the beginning of the book she acts as if she loves him very much. Not until she says, "Or if anything else should happen to me-anything, for instance, that might prevent me from being here-" (Isben 45) does anyone think about Nora leaving Torvald. At the end of the play she calls Torvald a "stranger" and walks out.

Verbal irony is also present in

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Approximate Word count = 1275
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English