Question

Helmer: What sort of an expression is that to use about our marriage?

Nora [undisturbed]: I mean that I was simply transferred from papa's hands into yours. You arranged everything according to your own taste, and so I got the same tastes as you—or else I pretended to, I am really not quite sure which—I think sometimes the one and sometimes the other. When I look back on it, it seems to me as if I had been living here like a poor woman—just from hand to mouth. I have existed merely to perform tricks for you, Torvald. But you would have it so. You and papa have committed a great sin against me. It is your fault that I have made nothing of my life.

Helmer: How unreasonable and how ungrateful you are, Nora!

–A Doll’s House,
Henrik Ibsen

What evidence from the text best supports the theme that the oppressed live unsatisfying lives? Check all that apply.

“I was simply transferred from papa’s hands into yours.”
“I had been living here like a poor woman.”
“I have existed merely to perform tricks for you.”
“It is your fault that I have made nothing of my life.”
“How unreasonable and how ungrateful you are.”

Answer 1

Choose all that apply: the first four. Each of these lines spoken by Nora shows her lack of agency and fulfillment:
- “I was simply transferred from papa’s hands into yours.”
- “I had been living here like a poor woman.”
- “I have existed merely to perform tricks for you.”
- “It is your fault that I have made nothing of my life.”

“How unreasonable and how ungrateful you are.” is Helmer’s dismissal and does not support the theme.