The Hidden Nora (and I Really Hate Torvold)

Throughout my reading of Ibson’s A Doll’s House, I constantly found myself wondering, “Is this a joke? Or can a married couple seriously be this blaringly obnoxious, fake, condesending, and overall dumb?” I found Torvold Helmer to be patronizing and—for lack of a stronger, more insulting term—frustating, and I genuinely could not stand his seemingly one-dimensional character. I knew him as “the working husband” that somehow manufactured pet names for his wife that made me gag and die a little bit inside. No, Torvold. She is not a squirrel. For that matter, she is neither your sky lark, nor your pet, nor your child. No, Torvold. You are not right about absolutely everything, regardless of what you have been told or what your arrogance has led you to believe. Torvold—my little song bird, my little squirrely squirrel prancing among the trees, and the butterflies, and the dandelions, and my projectile vomit—you’re an ungrateful, demeaning know-it-all, and I am glad Nora left you.
Now for Nora. I personally found Nora to be a much more interesting character whose motives , but not her maturity nor her behavior, place her among the company of classic literary characters as Antigone and perhaps even Hamlet. However, I am still endlessly curious as to one thing: was Nora playing dumb throughout the entire play? Did she knowingly live in a situation in which she was valued as nothing more than a pet or a child; and did she choose to ignore this situation because of her immaturity, or because of her hopes for a “miracle” and her blinded faith in Torvold’s love for her? I believe that Nora was well aware that she was not valued. I believe that she sole reason for which she felt the need to constantly rehash the fact the “Torvold loved her terribly” when she was amongst other company was to fool herself into believing such an idea. The love between a husband and a wife is one that must also exhibit a level of respect and selflessness, and it is anything but similar to the love between a father and a daughter, an owner and a pet, a teacher and a student. I believe that Nora excused the absence of this particular type of love because she absolutely felt the need to wait for Torvold. She proved her love for him by committing forgery to save his life, and she was waiting for the miraculous act she was sure she would receive—all in due time. And when this miraculous event should take place—when Nora’s act of love and desperation is finally to be recognized and reciprocated with another act love from Torvold—Torvold’s condescension and scolding arrives in its place. And in that moment, the thinnest sliver of all that was holding the real, restrained, and independent Nora buried beneath the façade of a pathetic, doting housewife was broken, and Nora left Torvold.

She left her home and her husband, and children and her maid, her false pretense and her old life. She left to search for independence, and perhaps even for true love. She left to search for respect, and to rid herself of the unfullfilling, empty life she once led.