A Doll’s House Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906)

Introduction A Doll’s House premiered on December 21, 1879 in Copenhagen, Denmark Two weeks before production, the play was printed in book form and sold 8,000 copies within two weeks. It was a huge hit in Scandinavian countries, but it was not produced in other European countries until two years after the premiere in Copenhagen. However, it was banned for a longer period of time in London and premiered there in 1889, followed by a production in New York in 1894. The play has been adapted for film several times. Of particular note are the versions from 1972, with one version starring Jane Fonda, David Warner, and Trevor Howard, and the other directed by Patrick Garland, starring Claire Bloom, Anthony Hopkins, and Ralph Richardson.

Controversy This play was considered controversial (bordering scandalous) since it questioned the traditional husband and wife roles in marriage and seemed to argue for the liberation of women. Ibsen claimed that he was arguing not for women’s rights, but rather for justice for all humanity. Ibsen had to write an alternate ending for the German debut of the play for it to be approved.

Henrik Ibsen Born in Skien, Norway in 1828. He had a difficult childhood. The family became impoverished when he was six, and the family business failed. His father became depressed and alcoholic, and eventually, his mother left his father. Ibsen worked as an apprentice to an apothecary and considered studying medicine. Instead, he decided to devote himself to writing and working in the theater. By his early twenties, Ibsen earned a living by writing and directing plays in various Norwegian cities. He became the director of the Norwegian Theatre in Bergen, Norway’s second largest city.

Henrik Ibsen (continued) He became the creative director at the National Theater in Christiania (renamed Oslo) and married a year later. He once told a friend that to understand him one needed to understand the severe northern Norwegian landscape, in which the winters left people isolated and inclined to introspection and perhaps brooding. Many thought Ibsen cold and aloof. In 1864, Ibsen left Norway for virtually a twenty-seven year exile. However, all his plays would be set in Norway.

Henrik Ibsen (continued) He once commented, “Never have I seen my homeland so fully, so clearly, and at such close range, as I did in my absence when I was far away from it.” Ibsen returned permanently to Norway 1891, where he was celebrated as a national treasure, honored by theater-goers, scholars, and royalty. He had been the first Norwegian author to gain widespread acclaim outside his native country. Ibsen’s health deteriorated after a series of strokes in 1900. He died in 1906, leaving a profound mark on the world theater.

“After Shakespeare, without hesitation, I put Ibsen first.” ― Luigi Pirandello (1867-1936), Italian dramatist and novelist and the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1934.

Ibsen as Dramatist While his reputation might have waned over the years, Ibsen’s achievement is still widely acclaimed. His plays continue to be performed, read, celebrated, and discussed. Ibsen was a prolific playwright who wrote histories (Emperor and Galilean, 1873, e.g.), verse dramas (Peer Gynt, 1867), experimental dramas (The Master Builder, 1892), philosophical dramas (When We Dead Awaken, 1899), and more. However, he is best known for his plays of social commentary and psychological realism, like A Doll’s House, Ghosts (1881), An Enemy of the People (1882), The Wild Duck (1894), and Hedda Gabler (1890), among others. Through these and other plays, his influence on the development of the modern theater cannot be underestimated. He has been referred to as the “Father of Modern Drama.” Title page in the manuscript of When We Dead Awaken Title page in the manuscript of Ghosts Title page in the manuscript of Hedda Gabler Title page in the manuscript of The Master Builder

Realism in Theater The movement toward Realism in the theater began in Europe in the second half of the nineteenth century through playwrights like Ibsen, August Strindberg, and George Bernard Shaw. A Doll’s House played a significant role in the movement. Realism reached America later, finding its fullest expression in Eugene O’Neill. Realism began as a reaction to the excessively contrived, sentimental, and didactic melodramas that dominated drama in nineteenth-century Europe and America. Realists take a mimetic approach to theater, striving to create the illusion of everyday life on stage, with the audience’s eavesdropping on a slice of life. Realists tend to depict the middle, lower, and lower-middle classes: their work, family life, language, dress, and problems.

Realism in the Theater (continued) Realists prefer contemporary settings. In a direct response to melodrama, realists strive to create complex characters, to make internal conflict as dramatic as external conflict. They prefer the open ending, which does not resolve all the play’s questions and sometimes leaves in doubt the future of the protagonist. The resolution or denouement is generally short in realistic dramas and virtually non-existent sometimes.

Well-Made Play While Ibsen’s use of realist techniques and his frank discussion of social issues were innovative, he drew his form for A Doll’s House and other plays from the nineteenth- century “well-made” play. The well-made play is a carefully crafted work, neat in structure and obviously contrived in its numerous plot twists and turns. The emphasis is on plot not character development. The first act of a well-made play introduces the problem; the second act complicates it, and the third resolves it.

Well-Made Play (continued) The characters tend to be types, the overly concerned parent, the straying child, the corrupt businessman. Characters are uncomplicated and easily identified as hero and villain, good guy and bad guy. The well-made play relies on standard devices: exposition conveyed through gossipy servants, plot complications from lost or forged documents, and resolutions from the entrance of an absent family member or the recovery of letters and documents. The most famous author of well-made plays was Eugène Scribe (1791-1861) who wrote hundreds of plays, several of which Ibsen directed.

Ibsen as Individualist While his politics and radicalism were indefinite, Ibsen was a staunch advocate for individual freedoms and rights. “I think that all of us have nothing other or better to do than in spirit and sincerity to realize ourselves. That, to my mind, is the real liberalism.” He once said that the state “is the curse of the individual.”

Ibsen and Writing Plays “Always I proceed from the individual; the stage-setting, the dramatic ensemble, all that comes naturally and causes me no worry, once I feel sure of the individual in every aspect of his humanity. I must penetrate to the last wrinkle of his soul.” Ibsen made at least three major drafts of his plays. In the first, he said that he knew the characters like people on a railway journey; in the second, he knew them as one knows someone after four weeks at the same spa, and in the third, as intimate friends. Henrik Ibsen paa Verdens-Theatret : 1898 Caricature by Alfred Schmidt in Hver 8. Dag.

Marriage A Doll’s House raises many questions about the institution of marriage, questions which many nineteenth-century audiences found disturbing. In the opening scene, Torvald treats his wife as a child, addressing her with nauseating pet names, forbidding her sweets, and educating her, so he thinks, with moralistic platitudes: “No debt, no borrowing. There can be no freedom or beauty about a home life that depends on borrowing and debt.”

Characters Primary Secondary: most are functional Nora (wife and mother) Torvald (husband and father, manager of a bank) Secondary: most are functional Krogstad Mrs. Linde Anne-Marie Dr. Rank

There lived a woman named Abigail who was in love with a socially important man named Gregory. Gregory lived on the shore of a river. Abigail lived on the opposite shore of the same river. The river that separated the two lovers was teeming with dangerous alligators. Abigail wanted to cross the river to be with Gregory. Unfortunately, the bridge had been washed out by a heavy flood the previous week. So she went to ask Sinbad, a riverboat captain, to take her across. He said he would be glad to if she would consent to deliver illegal drugs to a teenage dealer on the other side. She promptly refused and went to a friend named Ivan to explain her plight. Ivan did not want to get involved at all in the situation. Abigail felt her only alternative was to accept Sinbad’s terms and deliver the drugs. Sinbad fulfilled his promise to Abigail and delivered her into the arms of Gregory. When Abigail told Gregory about her illegal escapade in order to cross the river, Gregory cast her aside because he thought that his reputation would be damaged when people heard what his fiancé had done. Heartsick and rejected, Abigail turned to Slug with her tale of woe. Slug, feeling compassion for Abigail, sought out Gregory and beat him brutally. Abigail was happy at the sight of Gregory getting his due. As the sun set on the horizon, people could hear Abigail laughing at Gregory. *Source of original story Simon, S. B, Howe,

Alligator Exercise Listen to the story. Instructions: After reading the story, rank the five (5) characters in the story beginning with the one whom you consider as the “most morally offensive” and end with the one whom you consider the “least objectionable.” That is, the character who seems to be the most dishonorable to you should be entered first in the list following the story, then the second most dishonorable, and so on, with the least dishonorable or objectionable being entered fifth. Very briefly note why you rank them in the order that you do.

Rank 1. ______________________ (most dishonorable) Characters: Abigail, Gregory, Ivan, Sinbad, Slug 1. ______________________ (most dishonorable) 2. ______________________ 3. ______________________ 4. ______________________ 5. ______________________ (least dishonorable)

Discuss: • On what basis did you judge the morality or immorality of the characters? • Is it ever right to do something wrong to achieve a good end? • What is virtue? How do we judge it? • Is there absolute good or evil? Or are there degrees of good and evil?