Themes
1 The individual and society
- Nora is shaped by men’s expectations.
- She has few chances to make decisions, and hence shape a self.
- At first bored by ‘society’, she learns to understand other people.
- Her experience makes her determined to ‘find out the truth about myself and about life’ (Act 3, p. 99).
2 Heredity
- Helmer says Nora has inherited her father’s irresponsibility (Act 1, p. 26).
- Rank knows he has inherited his father’s disease (Act 2, p. 65).
- Heredity had become a burning question since Darwin’s The Origin of Species appeared in 1859, twenty years earlier.
- The play suggests that character is shaped by choices, rather than inherited.
3 Theatricality
- Helmer tells Nora, ‘don’t be melodramatic’ (Act 3, p. 94).
- However, both model their behaviour on the conventional drama of their time.
- Such drama might well end with the heroine’s suicide, or with her rescue by the male lead.
- The ending shows Nora abandoning her stereotype and implies that the old plays are no guide to modern conduct.
4 Death
- Nora considers drowning herself like the heroine of a melodrama.
- Krogstad confronts her with realistic images of herself as an ugly corpse (Act 2, p. 73).
- She ultimately chooses to change her life, not idealise suicide as noble sacrifice.
- The play’s setting close to the winter solstice links it to the theme of death and rebirth.
5 Money
- The plot turns on the two hundred and fifty pounds Nora has borrowed by forging her father’s signature.
- Helmer’s terror of debt shapes his behaviour at home.
- However, he is responsible for large sums of money in his work.
- Despite her ignorance of the law, Nora may have a better grasp of the proper management of money than Helmer.
Copyright © York Press, 2017