Summary:
Discusses the Henrik Ibsen play, A Doll's House. Describes how Torvald Helmer is symbolic to the stereotypical 19th century husband as proven by characterization of pride, dominance, and his treatment towards others around him.
The 19th century husband is eminent due to his persona. In the play," A Doll's House," by Henrik Ibsen, Helmer becomes symbolic for the 19th century husband as proven by characterization of pride, dominance, and his treatment towards others around him.
In the play "A Doll's House," Ibsen uses the characteristic of pride to make Helmer become a symbol of the 19th century husband. As any husband of the 19th century, pride is a personality trait. For example, in the play "A Doll's House," Helmer is known to be "a man with a great deal of pride." Helmer thinks that "it is terribly embarrassing and humiliating for him if he owed anything to a woman." This is symbolic to the 19th century husband, because just as the 19th century husband feels that he is better than a woman and that a woman can never provide him with anything, the same attributes are inflicted on Helmer through the author's characterization. Another example of how the author uses pride to make Helmer become symbolic of the 19th century husband is the fact that Helmer refuses to borrow money or owe debts. Helmer feels that he should "never borrow, there's always something inhibited about a home built on....borrowed money."Helmer uses his pride to push aside the idea of borrowing or owing money simply because he is a man. These two examples describe how Ibsen uses the characterization of pride to make Helmer become a symbol of the 19th century husband.
Ibsen develops Helmer to portray dominance in the play "A Doll's House," to become a symbol for the 19th century husband. In the 19th century, the husband played the role as the leader of the household and the person who earned the income for the family. Just as Torvald Helmer. Helmer has a new job at the bank, where he is making a lot of money. Nora, his wife, does not work, and depends on Helmer for money. Helmer uses the job to establish his leadership when he also provided Mrs. Linde with employment at the bank. Helmer shows dominance because Nora's dependence. Nora looks to Helmer as if he is superior to her which makes him feel dominant. Another example of Helmer's dominance is how he dehumanizes Nora by calling her child like names. For example he calls Nora ." . . . . my little squirrel frisking about," or ." . . . . my little skylark." This shows dominance because he uses names of child like objects that are not equivalent to a human. Along with the dehumanizing names, Helmer also treats Nora as a child by taunting her about spending money and giving her money to make her vanish for hours at a time. Ibsen uses these examples of dominance to clearly portray Helmer to be symbolic of the 19th century husband.
In the play "A Doll's House," Helmer was not always portrayed to be egotistical and possessive but yet did impact on a character on a positive aspect. For example, Helmer did Kristine Linde some good when he enabled her employment at his place of work at the bank Mrs. Linde needed this job to support herself. Helmer did a positive deed for her but in order to satisfy Mrs. Linde, he had to hinder the well being of Krogstad. Krogstad was trying to make a better reputation for himself but was denied this opportunity by Helmer. Helmer took Krogstad's job which resulted in a negative situation for Krogstad. These examples show how husbands of the 19th century were more than just possessive, but affected the lives of people around them. Ibsen uses Helmer's treatment of people around him to portray how he becomes symbolic to the 19th century husband.
Clearly, as proven by the characterization of pride, dominance, and the treatment of others around him, Ibsen uses Helmer to become symbolic of the 19th century husband. The author has taken Helmer and inflicted characteristics of possessives in his character to make him more symbolic. In the play, "A Doll's House," Helmer is the perfect symbolism of the 19th century husband.
This is the complete article, containing 679 words
(approx. 2 pages at 300 words per page).
