…and now some thoughts

So as I described in a previous post, I’ve been neck-deep in Victorian era literature as of late, and I decided to reread that mainstay of high school English curricula, A Doll’s House, by the 19th Century Norwegian playwright, Henrik Ibsen. Ibsen is often referred to as the originator of realist drama, and is vaunted for his direct treatment of aberrant social behaviors.

After reading the play, I’m not surprised that it is often assigned to high schoolers: the social stakes are pretty obvious, and the social positions occupied by the main players are unambiguous. Since the husband/wife dichotomy has probably been beaten to death — though I will have something to say about it later — I’d like to take a look at something more subtle in the play: the pervasive use of monetary language.

Though the play is often viewed in terms of Nora’s proto-feminist struggle, Ibsen couches his characters’ power in the language of money. The very first scene of the play involves a monetary transaction, for which Nora is condescendingly scolded by Torvald. Then, when Torvald’s “little squirrel is out of temper,” he plies her with a gift of two pounds. We of course later learn why Nora needs the money, but her subservient role seems less due to her gender than to her economic dependency. When Christine Linde arrives, she compliments Nora on her husband’s new appointment at the bank, saying that “it would be delightful to have what one needs,” to which Nora replies, “No, not only what one needs but heaps and heaps of money.” Though one could easily chalk this up to Nora’s crassness, or her preoccpuation with her debt, I think Ibsen is pointing to the classic and preponderant middle-class concern about money. Nora wishes for the security that money provides; it seems that power and security are less gendered in this play than at first glance, and are intimately tied to one’s income.

The linkage between working for wages and individuality is furthered during Nora’s discussions with Linde. Linde is a widow who has had to work to keep her family afloat, and it is clear that Nora envies her freedom. At one point in their meeting, after Nora has divulged her secret about the loan, she admits that “[she has] found other ways of earning money…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.” Here again power is not necessarily gendered; rather it is earning potential that is gendered. Christine, who works and provides for herself, is not nearly as powerless as Nora, and is actually able to effect a favorable outcome for the Torvalds at the end of the play. She later tells Krogstad, “I could not endure life without work…I have worked, and it has been my greatest and only pleasure.”

The play’s saturation with monetary language has its apogee in a single exclamation of Dr. Rank’s. He arrives at the Torvald house to tell them of his impending death, and explains to Nora that “Lately I have been taking stock of my internal economy. Bankrupt!” Though Rank clearly means his health, “internal economy” also seems to include some kind of moral deficiency; this evidenced by Rank’s proposition to Nora. Rank describes his failing body in economic terms, thereby equating virility with wealth. In this sense, money becomes associated with both social standing and physical health.

The readings of this play that laud Nora for her proto-feminism are certainly correct, though somewhat facile. I think the play is in fact less sexist (or at least less a commentary on sexism) than one might think. Christine Linde holds a position of power over Krogstad, as well as the fate of the Torvalds, because she is economically independent. Nora’s unemployment and economic dependency are what cause her oppression, not her gender.

Ibsen is not alone in his preoccupation with money: Dickens’ Little Dorrit is all about the horrors of debt, and Vanity Fair describes the ever precarious economic fortunes of its characters. (It seems pertinent here to mention that strong, independent women are featured in both of these novels; Becky Sharp being the quintessential “deceitful woman.”) In the 19th Century, artificial stock bubbles were commonplace, and investors would gain and lose fortunes in a heartbeat. It seems that wealth’s importance — both for independence and for survival — penetrated Ibsen’s realist drama as well.