A doll's house - Form and structure.

        Instead of the characters being plain with no depth all of Isben’s main characters are complicated people with problems that the audience can relate to. We as the audience can learn something about yourself and the world through the characters feelings. For example Nora’s dilemma makes you think about your own ideas about relationships.

        One of Isben’s other structural techniques he used is all the main events that are spoken about have already happen before the play has started. They are revealed and explained in different ways as the play progresses.  For instance the main past event of the play we are told about is Nora secret loan she got by forging her father’s signature. Other important past events are Krogstad’s crime, Mrs Linde’s marriage and Dr Rank’s inherited fatal illness.

        The play is set over a period of three days, so the action is very compressed. The five major characters are all closely related and there lives all cross one another somewhere in the play. One characters actions affect most of the other main characters in some way. Even a small part like the nursemaid is tied in to the major theme of Nora’s maturity from child to child-wife to women. She doesn’t just connect Nora to the past but indicates the future when Nora leaves her own children in the care of another person.

        Every prop and costume is meant to symbolic also every conversation is layered with meanings. For example Nora addresses her baby as “my sweet baby doll” a reminder of her own doll role. Also when she plays hide and seek with her older children symbolising the hidden truth.

             The overall action is constructed to make you feel the tension mounting within the play. In act one everyday events are disrupted by interruptions and revelations. In act two, thoughts of death and suicide conclude in the climax of Nora’s frantic change around in her life. And finally in act three, the audience feels calm as the confrontation between Nora and Torvald approaches. The plays final climax is Nora’s decision to depart and leave Torvald thinking she will be gone forever. The audience knows that this isn’t really the end as we learnt before Mrs Linde left Krogstad but eventually ended up with him again as she was unable to leave alone as she thought.