Passages from A Doll's House

A marriage described as a playroom, by the person who was the favourite doll.

NORA. No, only merry. And you have always been so kind to me. But our home has been nothing but a playroom. I have been your doll-wife, just as at home I was papa’s doll-child; and here the children have been my dolls. I thought it great fun when you played with me, just as they thought it great fun when I played with them. That is what our marriage has been, Torvald.

The moment being reasonable stops meaning being obedient.

NORA. I don’t believe that any longer. I believe that before all else I am a reasonable human being, just as you are—or, at all events, that I must try and become one. I know quite well, Torvald, that most people would think you right, and that views of that kind are to be found in books; but I can no longer content myself with what most people say, or with what is found in books. I must think over things for myself and get to understand them.

A woman argues that the law must be wrong because it cannot see her motives.

NORA. I don’t believe it. Is a daughter not to be allowed to spare her dying father anxiety and care? Is a wife not to be allowed to save her husband’s life? I don’t know much about law; but I am certain that there must be laws permitting such things as that. Have you no knowledge of such laws—you who are a lawyer? You must be a very poor lawyer, Mr. Krogstad.

Why a husband ignores his wife at parties, and why it is not indifference.

HELMER. Yes, my own darling Nora. Do you know, when I am out at a party with you like this, why I speak so little to you, keep away from you, and only send a stolen glance in your direction now and then?—do you know why I do that? It is because I make believe to myself that we are secretly in love, and you are my secretly promised bride, and that no one suspects there is anything between us.

Two people compare their lives to a wreck they are still clinging to.

KROGSTAD.What do you mean by that?MRS LINDE.You said you were like a shipwrecked man clinging to some wreckage.KROGSTAD.I had good reason to say so.MRS LINDE.Well, I am like a shipwrecked woman clinging to some wreckage—no one tomourn for, no one to care for.KROGSTAD.It was your own choice.MRS LINDE.There was no other choice—then.

The secret pleasure of earning your own money for the first time.

NORA. Well, then I have found other ways of earning money. Last winter I was lucky enough to get a lot of copying to do; so I locked myself up and sat writing every evening until quite late at night. Many a time I was desperately tired; but all the same it was a tremendous pleasure to sit there working and earning money. It was like being a man.

The question every parent is afraid to ask the person who knows the children best.

NURSE.You see, they are so accustomed to have their mamma with them.NORA.Yes, but, nurse, I shall not be able to be so much with them now as Iwas before.NURSE.Oh well, young children easily get accustomed to anything.NORA.Do you think so? Do you think they would forget their mother if shewent away altogether?

The institution that promotes the people it suspects, and ignores the healthy.

RANK. Yes, he has some sort of appointment there. [To Mrs Linde.] I don’t know whether you find also in your part of the world that there are certain people who go zealously snuffing about to smell out moral corruption, and, as soon as they have found some, put the person concerned into some lucrative position where they can keep their eye on him. Healthy natures are left out in the cold.