A Doll's House Context

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Matt Cuzner

Ibsen’s A Doll’s House was written in a time when theatre was changing, and Ibsen was one of the creators of this new style of writing. Henrik Ibsen was born in Norway in 1828. During Ibsen’s childhood his father encountered many financial difficulties and in 1835 the family was forced to move because their property was seized for payment of debts. Ibsen had an unhappy childhood due to rumours that Knud Ibsen was not his father, and despite the physical resemblance Ibsen believed these rumours to be true. Ibsen moved away from his parents in 1844 and during his early adult years Ibsen befriended members of the socialist movement and a left wing politician. This then led him to write for a radical magazine, where police raided the offices. Two of his co-workers were imprisoned for three years but Ibsen didn’t speak out.

Before A Doll’s House Ibsen wrote many plays, but up until 1864 most were unsuccessful but he made his break when he started writing plays designed to be read, the first of which was Brand. This play created an immediate sensation and established Ibsen’s reputation in Scandinavia. In 1869 Ibsen’s A League of Youth was performed at the Christiana Theatre, it caused controversy because of it’s characterisation of progressive personalities. One of the characters complains: ‘You dressed me up like a doll; you played with me as one plays with a child.’ In George Brandes review he suggested such a character would make a good central figure to later work.

A Doll’s House was one of Ibsen’s plays written in his new style of naturalism, a departure from romanticism, the exaggeration of ideas and actions. Naturalism was Ibsen’s way of representing what was real; he used his plays to focus on key issues. By making his plotlines and characters as real as possible Ibsen felt that he could achieve this properly. Naturalism is represented in A Doll’s House mainly through Nora, the main character in the play. Nora is a very realistic character and she expresses views and ideas similar to those that other women would express in the same situation. Ibsen also uses naturalism in A Doll’s House through the way he focuses on a very controversial issue, and how he represents it realistically rather then watering it down as not to offend audiences, as romanticism does..

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A Doll’s House is a play that deals with many feminist issues and it was published around the time the first notions of suffragettes were beginning to arise. The suffragettes were officially formed in 1897 by Millicent Fawcett and under the name ‘National Union of Women's Suffrage’. However it was around the time of publication that the first ideas for such a group were arising. The suffragettes were a group of women campaigning for equal rights for all men and women. They worked towards this by protesting in ways such as chaining themselves to fences; setting fire to post boxes ...

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