THEME OF MARRIAGE IN A DOLL'S HOUSE

Henrik Ibsen explores marriage as a tool for women subjugation and at the same time as a weapon of financial emancipation. He also looks at marriage as a level-headed arrangement between two like-minded individuals.

Marriage is one of the most celebrated unions in the world. Similarly, it enjoys such high moral ground in religious and many cultural circles. In A Doll’s House, Henrik Ibsen explores this vital part of the society in the life and times of Nora, her husband Torvald Helmer and other characters.

From the onset, marriage seems a happy association since Nora is jubilant and bubbly as a wife. Although money could be one of the factors that threaten this marriage, Nora is capable of handling it. Torvald is very particular about the family’s expenditure and warns Nora to be careful. Being naïve and playing innocence helps Norah to get away with her husband’s restraint.

In their association, Helmer holds the high moral ground, chief financier and key decision-maker. He feels it a weakness to take advice from a woman. This makes him stand ground on his decision to fire Krogstad.

Mrs Linde’s marriage, on the other hand, was a marriage of convenience. She was in love with Krogstad, but she decided to marry a man of means because she needed to help her mother and two brothers financially. According to her, the chances of Krogstad making it in life were hopeless at the time. Anyway, when the man she married dies, she is free to reunite with her former love.

Marriage is a union of two like-minded individuals. As seen in the play, Krogstad settles down when he meets Mrs Linde. In the beginning, Krogstad was a bitter vengeful person, but when he meets Mrs Linde, he is ready to forgive anything. In fact, he is ready to ask Helmer for his letter back but Mrs Linde dissuades him from doing so.

According to Mrs Linde, a good union should be built on mutual trust with no secrets. The fact that Nora has kept such a secret from her husband shows that their marriage is built on falsehood. If Nora’s marriage is to work, she should reveal her true self to her husband.

This does not actually work for Nora. Indeed, Nora’s union was a meeting of unlike-minded individuals. Whereas Nora was a free-spirited risk-taker, Helmer was rigid and callous with an outward look at the society. Although at the beginning their marriage worked, it was just a time bomb waiting to explode.

Henrik brings an interesting conversation around marriage in this play. Firstly, there is the question of why we get married as seen in Mrs Linde’s marriages. And then there is the question of compatibility; not only physical but mental and in a way spiritual. Matrimony is a meeting of like minds for it to work and that is why Helmer’s family breaks apart.