Critics for Ibsen - complete Flashcards
Belinda Jack - Questions
A Doll’s House ‘is full of ambiguities. It asks questions but doesn’t answer them.
Belinda Jack - Alternative ending
‘Barbaric outrage’ - Ibsen
Belinda Jack - Performance in marriage
Their marriage has been play-acting for the sake of appearances
Belinda Jack - Audience engagement
The audience must retain a critical distance from the play to be encouraged to think, not simply passively to watch
Sophie Duncan - Social laws
Ibsen believed there were ‘two types of moral laws, one for men and one, quite different, for women
Sophie Duncan - Melodrama
Nora wants to behave like a melodramatic heroine as she puts love before all
August Strindberg
People stopped regarding marriage as an automatic provider of absolute bliss
Elizabeth Robin
No drama has ever meant more to women on the stage than Henrik Ibsen’s has
Sophie Duncan - Alternative play
Ghosts offers an alternative ending, the truth if a woman stays
Sophie Duncan - Contamination
Fears of contamination becoming a metaphor for morality and sin
Kathryn Hughes - Jobs
Men became defined by their jobs
Kathryn Hughes - Moral superiority
Women were viewed as morally superior to their husbands and were expected to counteract the taint of the public sphere
Mary Wollstonecraft - Vindication for the rights of women
She was referred to as a ‘hyena in petticoats with a ferocious bite’ due to her discussion of the wrongs and suffering inflicted upon women
Jan Marsh - Male consequences of the patriarchy
The patriarchy was much more destructive than initially believed
Queen Victoria - Gender
God created men and women differently
Greg Buzzwell - The New woman
the air of sexual freedom
Greg Buzzwell - Threat of the New Woman
‘undermined the traditional view of masculinity’
Ibsen - Modern society
A woman cannot be herself in modern society
Ibsen - Dramatic exploration
Ibsen has stated that his play was intended to be a dramatic exploration of freedom and truth which both link to the feminist movement
Liam McNamara - Performance
The way that the play never shows us the ultimate result of Nora’s decision further reinforces the idea that the performance of gender is much more contemporary
Tony Coult - Feelings
Powerful feelings breaking through surface appearance
Tony Coult - Normalcy
Naturalism also suggests that big emotions are held under the surface and held back under a facade of normalcy
Tony Garland - Villain
We as the audience want to define characters as evident villains, yet since each character is morally conflicted we can’t strictly define who is a ‘villain’
John Hathaway - Uncanny
Uncanny presentation of humans (as dolls)
John Hathaway - Masks
Ironically, it is Torvald who uses metaphors of masking and acting
Sara Jan - Other plays
Ibsen does not repeat himself but explores the problems within society in different ways.
Sara Jan - Ghosts
Theme of ghosts from the past that metaphorically haunt the play
Brittany Wright - Portrait
Horrifyingly familiar portrait of the life of a typical Victorian woman
Brittany Wright - Restrictive social norms
Restrictive social norms are, for Ibsen, a worse disease (than physical contamination)
Joan Templeton - Everywoman
Ibsen stated that his play was ‘everywoman struggle against Everyman’
Joan Templeton - Slamming the door
Nora’s symbolic slamming of the door is often read as ‘silly theatrics’
Ibsen - Social purpose
I have never written any play to further a social purpose
Joan Templeton - Epiphany
Ibsen offers us a theatre of monstrous epiphany
Elettra Carbone - Mirror of A Doll’s House
The Nathanson family painting, which similarly depicts the bourgeoisie family
Elettra Carbone - Connection to the outside world
she is clearly positioned within the living room, unlike her husband, who has one foot inside the room and one foot on the outside, symbolising his role as the link between the outside world and the home.
Elettra Carbone - alternative endings and staging
2006 Egyptian production - the door is left ajar, which does not exclude Nora’s possible return
2002 German production - Nora shoots Torvald, removing any chance of reconciliation
2003 Mabou Mines Dollhouse - all the men were shorter than 4’6, with the miniature furniture catering to the men, rather than the women who were forced to conform to the ‘male’ setting
2009 - regendered performance with Torvald as the househusband, trying to reclaim his masculinity from the career-driven Nora
