A Dolls House Critics

Question 1

What did radical contemporary critic Mona Caird say about the transactional nature of relationships and when?

Answer 1

• 1888
• Argues common respectable marriage is ‘the most hypocritical form of woman-purchase’
• Argues ‘the economical independence of a woman is the first condition of free marriage’

Question 2

What does critic Hugh Stutfield say about the influence of the New Woman and when?

Answer 2

• 1891
• ‘the woman of the new Ibsenite neurographic is not only mad, but does her best to drive others mad too’

Question 3

What does critic Max Nordau say about the influence of Nora’s rejection and when?

Answer 3

• 1895
• Nora’s ‘idiocy’ became the ‘gospel for the hysterical of both sexes’

Question 4

What does Toril Moi say about how A Doll’s House questions the foundations of relationships and when?

Answer 4

• 2008
• A Doll’s House questions what it will take to build a relationship based on ‘freedom, equality and love’

Question 5

What does Toril Moi say about how Nora and Torvald partake in melodrama?

Answer 5

• 2008
• Nora and Torvald are ‘starring in various idealist scenarios of female sacrifice and male rescue’

Question 6

What did Ibsen say about the purpose of his plays and when?

Answer 6

Says they depend on the ‘demand for full ruthless truth to life’
1883

Question 7

What does Terry Otten say about sex in the play and when?

Answer 7

• 1998
• ‘the play is elementally about prostitution’

Question 8

What does conservative critic Clement Scott describe Torvald as

Answer 8

• 1889
• ‘sensual and egotistical’

Question 9

What subjects did late 1870s naturalist drama start to explore?

Answer 9

Tabboo subjects - examining how character’s heredity and environment shapes and dooms them, questioning religion and exploring supernatural elements

Question 10

What does Toril Moi say about the end revelation in A doll’s house and when?

Answer 10

• 2008
• ‘a moment of high melodrama’
• however, also subverted melodrama in the way Nora expects a ‘miracle’ but the conversation results in two people sitting at a table having a serious conversation

Question 11

Critic quote about the double standards between Torvald and Nora

Answer 11

• Mahaffey 2010: Torvald’s refusal to save Nora reflects the ‘different codes under which they had been living’

Question 12

What does Critic Toril Moi say about Nora challenging Torvald’s love

Answer 12

Nora ‘demands nothing short of a revolutionary reconsideration of the meaning of love’

Question 13

Why does Nora reject religion at the end?

Answer 13

Critic Lavender: She recognises Torvald’s ‘inadequacy as her god’

Question 14

What was Victorianism

Answer 14

The Bible was taken as the literal truth and was the foundation of moral behaviour

Question 15

Torvald’s manipulation of religion

Answer 15

His appeal to religion to get Nora to stay is a mere ineffectual excuse of patriarchal power ( critic Langas 2005)

Question 16

John Hathaway on Torvald as trapped

Answer 16

•Torvald is ‘blind to the limitations placed on him by society’
• Torvald is ‘unable to act outside of the confines of society’s strict rules and conventions’

Question 17

John Hathaway on Nora’s intelligence

Answer 17

• Nora ‘deliberately plays the role of helpless female in order to achieve her ends’
• through her ‘ability to manipulate and keep secrets’

Question 18

Ibsen’s interest in secrecy structurally

Answer 18

Ibsen was interested in inferiority, revealed through what he called ‘seemingly easy but concealing conversations’