[Music] in the introduction of the play a doll's house Nora hammer a young happy wife and mother of three enters her home followed by a porter toting a Christmas tree her husband Torvald calls out to her from his office he believes his wife is wasteful with money and teases Nora for spending too much in the rising action Nora shows Torvald her presence and requests money for her own Christmas present Torvald gives it but has no idea Nora needs money for a loan she borrowed without his consent that she's been working in secret to pay back her lender Christine a childhood friend of Nora's drops by and the two women discuss how their lives have changed since they last saw each other Nora brags about Torvalds new position at the bank and offers to convince him to hire Christine Nora then describes how she saved Torvalds life early in their marriage by providing the money they needed to spend a year in Italy but the loans lender crog's dad soon arrives to meet with Torvald doctor rank a close friend of Torvald and Nora comes in and gossips about crocks dad's bad reputation for being caught up in a scandal years ago Torvald meets Christine and says he's willing to give her a position at the bank where he's a manager crog's dad slips back into the house he thinks Torvald will replace him at the bank where he works with Christine whom he is known from the past crog's dad blackmails Nora watching her to influence Torvald to let him keep his job when Nora refuses Krogstad reminds her that she has committed fraud by forging her father's signature for the loan Nora tries to persuade Torvald not to fire crog's dad but Torvald fires crog's dad immediately instead of waiting until the new year Nora considers asking doctor rank for help but changes her mind when the doctor confesses his love for her crog's dad decides to expose Nora and drops a letter about the loan and forgery into a locked letter box outside of Torvalds office Nora tells Christine that crog's dad is her money lender Dean rushes out to convince crog's dad to recall the letter and expresses a desire to begin a new relationship with him even though she chose another man when they were younger crog's dad offers to recall his letters to torval but Christine tells him not to believing honesty will bring understanding in Donora and Torvalds marriage in the play's climax Torvald reads crog's dad's letter revealing the loan and forgery in the falling action Torvald calls Nora immoral showing his self-centeredness and chastises her viciously but a new letter from Kronstadt arrives saying he's forgiven the loan ecstatic that his reputation will not be damaged Torvald instantly forgives Nora Nora finally sees that her husband does not truly love her understand her she will always be nothing more than his dog she decides to leave her family educate herself and make her own way in the world in the resolution Torvalds sinks into a chair and despair his face buried in his hands the play famously closes with the flattening of a door [Music] five key characters take the stage in a doll's house and bring the powerful drama to life first is the protagonist Nora Helmer Nora is the cheerful wife of Torvald Helmer and the mother of their three children she takes small jobs and scrounges money from Torvald to pay back a secret loan she took without her proud husband's consent or knowledge for a trip his doctor said would save his life but this secret financial burden wears on her causing resentment a desire to be respected by her husband and freedom from the limitations society places on her because she's a woman but Nora's faith in her husband's superior morality unravels over the course of the play when he maligns her in response to the possibility that she'll hurt his reputation but then quickly restores it Nora realizes their marriage is a sham she leaves Torvald intent on discovering who she really is and what she really believes it Torvald Helmer is the condescending traditionally patriarchal husband of Nora he feels it's his duty to provide a moral reality for his wife including instructing her on how she should think feel behave and act he believes she needs constant guidance because she's intellectually inferior and childish but all the while he delights in her beauty Torvald resents Nora's deceased father for what he sees as negative character traits his wife has inherited without realizing that he is similar to the man he criticizes when Nora's secret is revealed he admits a narrow perspective rise to the surface as Nora leaves he is left adrift in confusion and despair Krogstad is trying to regain his reputation in an unforgiving society after being caught and ruined for a crime he committed in the past through employment in a bank where Torvald is the manager his desperation drives him to blackmail Nora it is Christine offering him a second chance that saves him it turns out he isn't motivated by money or desire to win respect from society rather he needs love understanding and honesty these things Christine offers end up redeeming him Christine lonely and tired arrives on Nora's step essentially in search of a reason to live having chosen money over love in her marriage she now finds herself without means or family life she tries to steer her friend Nora from making bad choices and losing all she has wishing for Nora to have a future based on honesty or understanding Christine drives Nora's revelation that she must seek self-awareness and independence and reverses her own misfortune finding love purpose and a second chance doctor ranked a close friend of Nora and Torvald diagnosis physical conditions and moral ailments of those around him like Torvald he believes that morality or immorality is inherited both physically nature and through upbringing nurture but dr. rank ultimately turns out to contrast Torvalds self delusion of moral superiority dr. rank sees reality he faces his impending death and admits his feelings to Nora making Torvald the only character in the play who remains clueless about his true nature money the tarantella dance and birds are the emblematic ornamental symbols at play in a doll's house [Music] money symbolizes men's control over women who were not allowed equal access to it the play begins with Nora coquettish Lee asking Torvald for money and ends with her refusing to take any belongings from his house except those she owned before they met earning a symbolic kind of freedom when she refuses her husband's financial help as she sets out to find herself in fact the entire plot of the play is driven by Nora's taking money in secret from crog's dad Christine in direct contrast to Nora has means to make money which gives her the power to make her own choices the tarantella is an Italian folk dance based on the frenzied movements victims make to draw out the poison after being bitten by a spider Nora's wild performance of this dance symbolizes the pretense Torvald and Nora have set in the play as the staple of their relationship he instructs she performs he criticizes and she dances faster to please but that doesn't please him either when Nora rehearses the tarantella she dances with wild abandon she's trying to please but she's also actually frantic perhaps to remove the poison of corruption Torvald had suggested she possesses when he refers to crog's dad's lack of character birds are also symbols that show up often when Nora is happy in the way Torvald likes and expects he calls her his Skylark or songbird when she's frightened she is his dove when she's unhappy Torvald scolds Nora referring to her in terms of birds such as a songbird must have a clean beak birds represent torvalds view of Nora as a fragile light creature meant to entertain and delight him but one he must also protect they also represent Nora's flight to freedom as she's like a bird in a cage singing for her keep in the beginning of the play but escaping her cage circumstances by the end key themes like sexism the individual versus society self-awareness and honesty contribute to the lasting resonance of the incredible play a doll's house sexism flows beneath Nora and Torvalds relationship one based on stereotypes their roles in the marriage are defined by what men and women are supposed to do rather than what might work for the couple as individuals Torvald represents the belief that women should accept a lesser status and value than men Nora represents the masses of women who have given up their unique identities in order to conform to societal stereotypes and these roles are just as false unfulfilled and unsustainable as the limiting men's beliefs that created them near the end of the play Torvald reveals the low regard he has for women incapable of seeing Nora as her own person with her own thoughts wants needs Nora knows she has no choice except to leave Torvald and her sexist marriage in order to find herself the theme of individual versus society comes up often especially when Krogstad brings up the central question of whether a person can truly be an individual within the boundaries of society to be an individual means to reject or to ignore social norms however characters surrounding Nora suggests that complete exclusion from society is impossible crog's dad has committed the same crime as Nora Christine has achieved the independence Nora longs for in the beginning of the play but both have paid a heavy price parallels between Nora and these characters who have lived outside of society's expectations anchors Nora's defiance of society itself [Music] the theme of self-awareness unfolds throughout Nora's journey at the beginning of the play Nora is unaware that she lacks self-awareness but as the play unfolds she gains a sense of this as she matches her intellectual moral and emotional viewpoints to those of her husband and father the horror of the thought of herself as being unworthy harmful to her children forces Nora to see the consequences of her actions at the end of act 2 and she withdraws incrementally from her children throughout the rest of the play dr. rank also represents this theme both in his ability to see that his death is nigh and to admit to Nora that he's in love with her he stands in stark contrast to his friend Torvald who exposes himself as a hypocrite and an unaware man honesty is another theme in the play as you cannot know yourself or have a healthy relationship without it the more Nora lies and hides from the truth the more confused she becomes but Christine serves to unravel the lies told the Torvald and the deeper lives of Nora's self-deception Christine's telling crog's dad to leave the letter that Torvald must read it makes the truth inescapable for Nora with the exposure comes the opportunity to take her flight to freedom the old adage the truth shall set you free rings particularly true by the end of the play you