A Dolls House Essay

[ryanhayes9]

has n e 1 read a dolls house?
I have an essay on it sue for english II honors ( im a sophmore)
i want to know what you all think.... she grades REALLY HARD. i havent passed a single essay this year yet....
Daniel Hayes
Ms.Johnson
English II Honors
22/11/2006
A Dolls House
Heinrik Ibsens, A Dolls House is a cleverly written novel which portrays the life of an average family living in the country of Norway. A Dolls House, throughout the first act puts an emphasis on the money this family as Torvold emphasizes to Nora about how he hates despises of taking out loans and being in debt to someone. Nora, who is the wife of Torvold and the mother of there children has a strong desire to obtain money that she can spend. Torvold accuses Nora of being wasteful with there money and that was a trait that she inherited from her father. When Torvold notices Nora takes offense to this comment he tries to cheer her up by saying that he loves his “lovely little songbird” just the way she is and that he would never want her to change. This introduction shows how there relationship to each other, as husband and wife really is, being a rather immature one Alas if something ever did happen to Nora, she would expect Torvold to take the fall for her as she sees any husband should for there wife, something that she calls “ the miracle”. A Dolls House is a cleverly written novel with many hidden messages throughout which could eventually lead to the demise of there relationship and quite possibly the end of there marriage.
As you begin to first read a dolls House, in act one, you the reader begin to depict how this family operates. Torvold, who is the husband of Nora is the obvious “leader” if most if not all of the financial decisions also. Torvold emphasizes on why he despises of
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loans and how he would never take one out because if something were to happen and
they could not pay back this loan they would be in trouble. Nora emphasizes that with his new position in the bank that it would be okay to do as he would be bringing home more money now, but Torvold still refuses. But there is a dark secret that Nora has kept from Torvold for many years. When Torvold became ill a few years back, Nora had to manage the family decisions including the financial ones because Torvold was too sick to. Eventually, she ran out of money and Torvolds condition continued to deteriorate. Nora saw no other way to save her husband but to take out a loan. She thought that Torvold wouldn’t mind because she was doing it for him. So she took out a loan of $250 from a man named Krogstad, who was also an employee at the same bank Torvold worked at. She agrees to pay him back in increments. The only problem was that she needed a cosigner to do this. Torvold was in too bad of health to do this so she forged her father’s signature on the form and dated it, not realizing that her father had died a few days before she dated the form. She turned in the form to Krogstad and got the loan to save Torvolds life. This secret, she has kept from Torvold for some time now as she fears telling him for his reaction to what she has done.
Torvold and Nora’s relationship is an immature and sometimes childish one at that. When Torvold is talking to Nora in act one, he refers to her as his “skylark” and his “squirrel”. He talks down to her as she is a child because she is a woman. Saying things like “Nora, my Nora that is just like a woman” which reveals Torvolds prejudice views toward women. Torvold in a way is acting sort of like a second father to her. He treats her like a child, giving her money when she asks for it and attempting to show her the way

 

[ryanhayes9]

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Some tasks are done. He tries to show her the way he runs the family finances and sometimes talks to her about his job at the bank. Like teaching a little child how to brush there teeth or how to ride a bicycle with no training wheels attached to the back for added stability.
Nora sees Torvold as her protector, if something were to happen, he should take the fall for her. Well, with Torvolds new promotion at the bank, Nora asks if he could get her friend ms. Linde a job there. He agrees to do that and does, but he fires Krogstad to do it. Krogstad becomes angry with him and tells Nora to get him his job back or he will give Torvold the IOU he has for the loan. Torvold will not do this because he thinks it will make him look unprepared and not sure. So Krogstad puts the IOU in there locked mailbox that only Torvold has the key to. Ms. Linde “persuades” Krogstad to ask for the letter back but Ms. Linde says no, that Torvold needs to know what Nora has done! So he does not ask for the letter back. Later, when Torvold goes to get the letter, he brings it up to his room to read it. He comes out yelling, “Nora”, asking her why she would ever think of doing something like this. He continues talking about how he cannot go back to his job at the bank because everybody will know what she did! When she hears him say what she did, she replies “when I am gone from this world you will be free” (Nora 1118) he replies by saying “Your father was always ready with some kind of remark” (Torvold 1118). He then opens the other letter from Krogstad saying that he is sorry for bringing this upon you and he gives the IOU back. Torvold is overjoyed, tearing it into a million pieces saying “I am saved! Nora I am saved!” Nora asks “what about me?” (Nora 1118) Torvold then replies “you too of course.” (Torvold 1118) The reader can tell that he is
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more concerned about his reputation then his own wife. At this point Nora realizes that “the miracle” is not going to happen he would not have taken the fall for her but let her take the fall for herself. At this point her mind is set; she is going to leave him. She asks him to sit down, that she needs to talk to him. She asks what the comments meant about her father. Torvold says “In a moment of excitement, surely you don’t think I meant it seriously?” He then goes on to say that she did what she thought was best and she did not know any better because she is a woman and does not know how the real world is run. She agrees with him by saying “I must educate myself, and you cannot help me with that. It is something that I must do myself, that’s why I am leaving you.”(Nora 1121) This back in that time was unheard of. A woman would never leave her husband. Then tells Torvold goodbye and leaves. In the nineteenth century a woman leaving her husband and children was unheard of and outraging. Most of the time men will leave there wives for one or another reason. This supports why Torvold yells at her for saying something like that, yelling that she thinks like “ a stupid little child.” Saying how immature he thinks Nora acts about the situation.
Many people back then would not condone what Nora does at all, leaving her husband and her own children. She acts and still does act like a little child from the beginning to the end of the story. I do think that because Nora kept this secret from her husband it slowly made the condition of her relationship with Torvold deteriorate. Also that there relationship is a rather immature one, and that Torvold would not take the blame for her over the IOU. These reasons are probably why Nora decides to leave Torvold and to set out in the real world to “educate” herself. If Krogstad would not have
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put the IOU in Torvolds mailbox, there relationship would most likely have lasted and continued the way that it had, where Torvold is the so called “leader” of there family, and in many ways like a second father to Nora. They do not have a “real” relationship between each other. More of a relationship between two children.

 

[reefeel]

You might want to consider reorganizing your paragraphs into the different themes of the novel and try to link paragraphs together, sometimes it seems repeatative. Make sure you have introductory and conclusion paragraphs. Make sure all of the book titles are underlined. Try reading it aloud to see if it sounds okay or read it aloud to your mom/dad/caretaker. I have never read this book nor have I heard of it so I can't tell how it is content wise. Just wait English gets better. My 10th grade teacher made me hate English. 11th grade was much better and this year I took AP. What is the teacher saying is wrong with your essays/papers. If it is your conclusions of the book and or symbols that is your opinion and she can't tell you that you are wrong.

 

[shogun323]

Sorry buddy. That's too much for me to read. ADHD here......
Anyway, best of luck to ya!!!

 

[dragonzim]

I agree with Reefeels post. You also need to really check over your punctuation as you need a lot of comma's in there that you dont have. Also, you use the words "there" and "their" a lot, and not always in the proper places.
I havent read the book, so I cant comment on the content of your essay.

 

[imurnamine]

If you would like, I will let my fiance' review your essay.
He is minoring in English. He's a genius. <3