Argumentation In Favor Of Ibsen’s Statement About The Nature Of Nora’s Departure

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Argumentation in favor of Ibsen’s statement about the nature of Nora’s departure.

In the Notes for “A Doll House” Ibsen states that “The wife in the play ends by having no idea of what is right or wrong; natural feeling on the one hand and belief in authority on the other have altogether bewildered her”. However, the play offers the audience two different approaches to understand the nature of Nora’s behavior. She might be seen as a woman that suddenly awakened into the ability to perceive herself after recognizing the negative role of her father and later, that of her husband, that prevented her to mature as an individual. This view should explain to the audience about the surprising metamorphosis of the protagonist into a “new” personality. From this point of view Nora wishes to obtain meaningful value for her life, however, she realizes that it can take place only if she will leave Helmer’s home. As an alternative, Nora might be seen as ordinary throughout the whole play, as the person that performs her own needs and does not attend to anybody else. From this point of view Nora really could be considered as one who doesn’t know “what is right or wrong”. There is an attempt below to analyze rightness of this approach regarding such aspects of Nora’s character as her personality, incapability to be responsible for her marriage, and her view of the social rules. She has no “idea of what is right or wrong” because she lacks fundamental concepts about human personality. She doesn’t know what she is doing because she suddenly realize her miserable situation that makes her incapable of making the compromise needed to continue with the marriage. Nora is bewildered because she can’t clearly understand the weight of the clash between social rules and morality.

Actually, treating Nora’s accusations requires extreme integrity. For example, when Nora states that Torvald has never conversed with her seri...