The characterization of Nora, Mrs. Linde and the nurse as a theme for female sacrifice in Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House Anonymous 12th Grade

Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House follows Nora Helmer’s stifled life within the confines of society’s patriarchal edifice and her own household. The depiction of Nora, her childhood friend Christine Linde, and the nurse Anne within this structure is reminiscent of their helpless female subordination within society. Henceforth, Ibsen’s tale engages its devices of characterization to heighten a theme of female sacrifice. This analysis argues that the characterization of Nora, Mrs. Linde and the nurse reveals the theme of female forfeit by unfolding the distinct sacrifices of each character vastly through their speech and actions; the characterization also divulges an interplay of choice and compulsion in the sacrifices made, as well as their inevitability seen through the character’s endings.

Through the characterization of Nora, the denotatively perceptible sacrifice is a financial burden. Nora’s sacrificial actions include her committing forgery of her father’s signature to obtain a secret loan and save her husband from illness. Nora confesses, “it was I who saved Helmer’s life” (Ibsen 10). To pay the loan, Nora secretly performs “needlework”, “crotchet work,” and “embroidery” (Ibsen 7). Thus, the ostensible sacrifice is that Nora...