Henrik Ibsen

          Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906) is a Norwegian playwright whose career culminates the dramatic shift from Romanticism to Realism in the late 19th to early 20th centuries. Although Ibsen is often referred to as “the father of modern drama,” he is heavily inspired by Romantic Idealism, which greatly informs his later works. Romantic idealism was coined by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and is grounded on the belief that natural and human existence consistent on the process of self-governing and self-determining reason, with an overarching quest for self-fulfillment.  Throughout the 1870s to 1880s, Ibsen was considered a realist critic of modern society who was unafraid to reveal his belief that heredity and the environment play an inevitable role in determining human fate.

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          Nora’s journey of self-fulfillment throughout A Doll’s House is the apotheosis of Ibsen’s ideologies within a guileful work of realism. This is most notably demonstrated in Nora’s first and final confrontation to Torvald before leaving. She states, “I’m a human being. Just like you are. Or at least I’m trying to become one. I know you’re right Torvald, according to most people and what it says in the books. But I can’t rely on that anymore, I must think things through for myself” (Ibsen, 82).  As seen between Torvald and Nora, Ibsen is interested in creating conflict that stems from the spiritual needs that drive individuals in contrast to the material limitations that restrain them.