Nora

• Nora is Torvalds wife and the mother of 3 children
• She saved Helmers life by borrowing money to pay for his convalescence (illness) and is secretly working to repay it
• The moneylender is Krogstad, he is blackmailing her as she forged the signature to get money
• When her husband shows he is willing to let her bear the consequences alone, she is disillusioned and leaves him
• Nora is one of the longest and most complex female dramatic roles
• She is presented as childish and flighty in Act 1
• She is presented as sober and independent in Act 3
• Ibsen establishes Nora as a person with a zest for life
• Nora's physical vitality suggests she has the energy to sustain the very difficult inner journey she undertakes
• Nora's tarantella show the instincts of a natural performer as dance lets her express things she can't say
• Nora is aware of "performing" the role of a wife which society has scripted for her
• She sees beauty as a power to get money but she knows it will die out
• Nora's less attractive qualities are a result of her upbringing and its limitations
• her naivete comes from her father who was capable of dubious behaviour
• her snobbish attitude to Krogstad reflects Helmer's own
• By the end of the play, Nora is actively interested in strangers and intends to do something about her ignorance
• She is aware by the end of the play that Helmer and her father have kept her in the "playroom"
• By the end of the play, Nora's personality has been largely put together by men and she is aware of that. The 2 men who love her and a whole spectrum of masculine authority from the law to the church. They have treated her like an object to be played with and sold
• By the end of the play, Nora replaces her fantasies of herself as a noble suicide and Helmer as the heroic miracle-worker with modest expectations
• Her decision to spend the night with Mrs Linde imply that she doesn't expect her life to be better than that of her old-school friend but she intends to work and is realistic as she is an experienced copyist and knows exactly what a woman can earn
• Ibsen suggested that if the "consciences" of sexes are different, the female conscience is more developed
• At the start of the play Nora gravitates towards the warmth and safety of the stove
• In the last act Nora is the giver of light to Dr Rank contrasting her to someone who takes light at the start of the play
• Nora is ordinary Norweigen