Bringing Dorian Gray to Film
Having finally gotten to see the movie I was most anticipating for 2009, the most recent film version of my favorite novel, and because I’ll take any opportunity I can get to discuss Dorian Gray in any way, shape, or form, I thought I’d take some blog space to look at the two most well-known attempts to turn Oscar Wilde’s only novel into a cinematic experience. Obviously, spoilers abound, both for the novel and the specific films.
I’ll be looking at what I consider key elements in telling of the story of Dorian Gray, which include: Sybil’s Fall, Dorian’s Arc, Hedonism, The Portrait, Lord Henry as the Devil, and the Opportunity for Salvation.
THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY (1945)
Writer/Director: Albert Lewin
Dorian: Hurd Hatfield
Lord Henry: George Sanders
Basil: Lowell Gilmore
Sybil: Angela Lansbury
3rd Act Love Interest: Donna Reed (as Gladys Hallward)
Sybil’s Fall: Taken by her beauty and her voice (in this version, Sybil is a chanteuse rather than a Shakespearean actress), Dorian is enthralled by this first love experience. He’s ready to commit to the fantasy and to Sybil, until Lord Henry suggests that he test her chastity. Dorian agrees, and Sybil, albeit reluctantly, fails that test. By giving herself to Dorian, she proves her unworthiness to him. He drops her; she commits suicide. While different and a bit more crude (but perhaps necessarily so for a cinematic version), this cut-and-dry destruction of the relationship is effective as Dorian’s first foray into manipulating those around him.
Dorian’s Arc: My issue with this version of Dorian is that we never really get to see any reaction from him. He never seems all that fazed by anything. He’s always wearing a mask, and he never shows his cards to anyone — not even the audience. In the novel, Dorian is extremely emotional and impetuous. When Lord Henry first needles him about the fact that he will age and his painting will not, Dorian petulantly throws himself onto the divan and has himself a good cry. We never get to see this sort of emotion from Hurt Hatfield’s Dorian. Whether by actor’s interpretation, writing or direction, he appears bored most of the film. As a reader, Dorian’s journey was of foremost interest to me. In this film version, we don’t get to go on that journey with Dorian; we only get to witness the events as they happen to him.
Hedonism: One aspect of the novel that is particular hard to translate to cinema is Dorian’s hedonistic lifestyle. The 1945 version takes the approach of the novel: it doesn’t show much at all, leaving the worst of Dorian’s sins to our imagination. In the novel, this is very effective. It’s less so in the film. However, considering the social climate at the time this film was made, the approach was appropriate. It pushed no boundaries on screen, but perhaps it did it the minds of the audience.
The Portrait: The only thing shot in technicolor in 1945′s otherwise black & white version, the portrait is certainly striking if a bit cartoonish.
Original
Defiled
Lord Henry as the Devil: In the 1945 version, Lord Henry gets the quips of the novel without as much of the bite. He’s not quite the master manipulator of either the novel or the 2009 version. For his role in Sybil’s fall, he simply tells Dorian what to do. He remains blissfully unaware of most of Dorian’s atrocities. He gives Dorian a philosophy, but it’s Dorian who runs with it full tilt.
The Opportunity for Salvation: Here we find Dorian also having grown bored with life, though his demeanor is not significantly changed from his youth. When he finds the opportunity for love with Basil Hallward’s niece, Gladys, he decides he must destroy the painting once and for all, so as not to fall back into temptation. Unfortunately, in doing so, he destroys himself. He dies as the man in the picture. The picture returns to its state of eternal, youthful beauty. Because we never saw the depths of Dorian’s despair, it was hard to feel the tragedy in his end. It felt neither earned or unfair; it was simply another event in the strange tale of Dorian’s life.
DORIAN GRAY (2009)
Writer: Toby Finlay
Director: Oliver Parker
Dorian: Ben Barnes
Lord Henry: Colin Firth
Basil: Ben Chaplin
Sybil: Rachel Hurd-Wood
3rd Act Love Interest: Rebecca Hall (as Emily Wotton)
Sybil’s Fall: In this version, Sybil once again gives herself to Dorian, though it’s worth noting she doesn’t take much convincing. (Who could blame her?) It’s not this that leads to Dorian’s shunning of her. Instead, it requires a bit more finagling on the part of Lord Henry, who takes Dorian to an opium den where he experiences both the pleasures of opium and the ladies selling it — an experience which also causes him to miss Sybil’s play. After the performance, when Sybil is already suspicious of Dorian’s whereabouts, Lord Henry pushes another thorn into Dorian’s side by asking Sybil when they plan to start a family. Her answer of “soon” causes a bit of hemming and hawing from Dorian. Lord Henry takes his leave (to the balcony to watch the fallout he’s masterminded). Dorian is extremely cold to Sybil, who begs him to make her his wife rather than one of his “whores.” At this point, Dorian walks away, lured by a life of new and unlimited experience rather than one of constancy.
If Sybil had been written as she was in the novel, Rachel Hurd-Wood would have been perfect casting. However, in the 2009 version, they make her much less of a wilting flower. It was never clear whether she was truly in awe of Dorian, as she was in the novel, or whether she simply wanted to make a good catch, so to speak. In some ways, they make her character much stronger, such as when she yells at Dorian to make her his wife instead of one of his whores. Because of this, we never see her crumble, never see her so fully crushed as we would need to to believe she would throw herself off a bridge.
Dorian’s Arc: One of the things I liked best about the 2009 version is that we followed Dorian’s journey much more closely. Ben Barnes as Dorian was as emotional as I’d hoped he’d be. We got to see him be frustrated with Lord Henry one moment and charmed by him the next. In one of his last scenes with Basil, we see him flip the switch from annoyed and cruel to the picture of innocence in one take. In that scene especially, we understand how hard it is for people to reconcile the rumors of Dorian’s lascivious lifestyle with that of his appearance. In contrast with Hatfield’s Dorian, Barnes’ Dorian runs the emotional gamut. He is constantly searching for more, both horrified by his actions but even more impressed by his own achievements. Only when he returns after a 25-year absence do we see that he has become bored with a life of hedonism. As he puts it, “pleasure is very different from happiness.”
Hedonism: The 2009 version takes the opposite approach of the 1945 version. It attempts to showcase Dorian’s hedonism: from an opium den threesome to engaging in a little “double or nothing” bet at a debutante ball to bisexual orgies and finally forays into sadomasochistic sex. The problem with such an approach, of course, is that this sort of behavior, visually sanitized for a UK rating of 15, is not quite as shocking as it perhaps should be. That being said, what was more effective than the actual events themselves was seeing their effects on Dorian. Seeing his reactions go from shocked and uncomfortable to manipulative and obsessed with consumption was much harder to watch than the shock-value sex scenes themselves. The occasional glimpse of clarity for Dorian (the news of Sybil’s death, the realization that he’s killed Basil, the moment of Jim Vane’s demise) are truly heartbreaking. It’s an emotional ride that isn’t present in the 1945 version.
The Portrait: Perhaps the aspect that has received the most criticism in the 2009 version is the heavily CGI portrait. This painting not only decays and devolves, but it also groans, moves, and is infested with maggots. In essence, it is supposed to be a living, breathing manifestation of Dorian’s soul: his unfortunate, trapped doppelganger. When Dorian attempts to kill it, it tries to escape from the confines of the canvas. It’s a good thought, but it’s not really all that effective. But again, with a modern audience, would a stationary painting really have provided the shock and awe required? There’s no denying that the CGI goes over the top, but the effort to visualize the incident is impressive in its gusto if not in its success.
Original
Defiled
Lord Henry as the Devil: Lord Henry is a much more active figure in the 2009 version. He not only provides the philosophy, but he pushes Dorian to explore it. He introduces him to gin, cigarettes, opium and sex. He opens Dorian’s eyes to the world of pleasure and encourages him to explore it to the fullest: “People die of common sense, Dorian, one lost moment at a time. Life is a moment; there is no hereafter. So make it burn, always, with the hardest flame.” At times he is explicit in his guidance, as when he places the “double or nothing” bet at the debutante ball. Other times, he is more serpentine, as in his role in the demise of Dorian & Sybil’s engagement. Dorian is everything he wishes he could be, and he enjoys pushing him. Only when he has something of his own to lose — his daughter, Emily — does he chastise Dorian for his actions. Even so, he never truly admits to his role in Dorian’s demise. Dorian, in some ways, finds his redemption. Lord Henry never does.
The Opportunity for Salvation: After having exhausted even his own depths for hedonism, Dorian returns to London, bored with life, cut off from the world he used to know both by rumor and by appearance. The society he knows has aged; internally, he has aged perhaps more than anyone, but none of that is visible. He has a notion that he might try to be good at this point — after all, what’s left? — but even that is an effort void of any joy. He is finally beginning to see the consequences of his actions, to truly feel them, and it’s not a pleasant experience. At a charity piano performance that hearkens back to his day as a true innocent, he is interrupted by the shouts of a man angry that his daughter has attended. He bellows to the crowd how absurd it is that such a cruel and morally decrepit man has received “a babe’s face.”
Later, Dorian finds himself accosted by Jim Vane, his mind ravaged by the loss of his sister 26 years ago. He escapes him once by way of his youthful looks and finally by a cruel twist of fate resulting in Jim’s death. Though he avoids bodily injury, the incident shakes him, perhaps for the first time since Sybil’s death. In a moment of panic, distraught, searching for some bit of salvation, he finds himself on the doorstep of his old friend, Lord Henry. Emily answers, and she comforts him, having already begun to fall for his tortured soul in the weeks since his return. She is the first source of comfort he’s had in years, and he seems to begin to understand the concept of love once again.
Despite Lord Henry’s understandable objections, the pair make plans to leave London so Dorian can start over. Lord Henry throws a party as a diversion so he can sneak into Dorian’s attic where the painting resides. This leads to a showdown between Lord Henry and Dorian. Emily arrives to find Dorian locked in the fiery attic with his painting. He has the key, and she begs him for it to unlock the door. Knowing what she will see, and knowing that he has the opportunity to spare her, he refuses. He professes his love and then sends her away, finally understanding what it is to put someone’s needs above his own. He turns to face his portrait, and thus his own demise. The last scene of the film shows the portrait, having survived the fire, returned to its innocent, youthful state, being locked in Lord Henry’s attic.
For me, 2009′s DORIAN GRAY has surpassed 1945′s THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY as the pre-eminent film version of Wilde’s novel. While the 1945 take is perhaps more faithful to the events of the novel, the 2009 version is a far more effective take on the heart of the novel. In the places where the 2009 version fails, it does so because it attempts to do more. I have a soft spot for films that are earnest in their endeavors, even when they’re not entirely successful. 2009′s DORIAN GRAY falls into that category.
On Twilight: An Explanation
[WARNING: Non-specific spoilers throughout.]
I have a confession to make: I get it.
You know. The whole Twi-hard thing. Sometimes I like to pretend I’m cool enough not to, but, in reality, I totally get it. And I’m going to do my best to explain it to those of you who don’t. Here goes.
If you have ever been in a very serious relationship between the ages of 17 and 20, then this might not require explanation. There’s something about that age, on the cusp of adulthood, that makes people think that a certain type of love relationship will last forever. Sometimes it does. Often it doesn’t. But my point here is that, at that age, love is an addiction stronger than heroin.
Not all teens are susceptible to this particular drug, and it is these people who cannot fathom what others see in all this TWILIGHT hysteria. But for anyone who has ever considered themselves in a fated relationship, become so wrapped up in another person that the thought of losing them is like having their soul ripped away from their bodies, or for anyone who has ever hoped for that sort of thing, TWILIGHT is like a mirror that shows the best possible version of that sort of relationship. It is the ideal. Yes, there are problems, but nothing really bad ever actually happens. Sure, lots of bad stuff almost happens, but the obstacles are always overcome (and most with relative ease).
It’s easy to make fun because, as adults, we know rationally that any sort of relationship that is that intense, that desperate, and at that young of an age, is probably not healthy. When Bella fights off depression and struggles with self-harm in NEW MOON, we want to tell her to grow up, snap out of it, and go see a psychologist if necessary. We want to tell her that life goes on, and she’ll survive and be all the better for it. And we want to smack her for treating her friends like, well, shit.
But, at least for me, in the back of my mind, a little voice says, “Hey, remember when you felt that way, too? Remember when you felt like death would be a more acceptable outcome than losing the one you loved? Remember how physical pain was somehow easier to deal with than emotional pain? Remember how you felt like no one else could possibly understand what you were going through? Remember the absolute relief of escaping a break-up? Don’t judge Bella (or Edward or Jacob) too harshly.”
And while now I realize that those thoughts were irrational and at times even harmful, I remember exactly how intense they were. I get it.
I want to note that this is not a defense of TWILIGHT or NEW MOON. I take major issue with a number of the themes in the books, most notably that this sort of co-dependent, irrational, unhealthy relationship is so heavily glorified. If I had come across these books and movies nearly a decade ago (ouch, has it really been that long?), I would have held them up as something to aspire to. Everything is magnified and amped up when you’re 18.
And it’s because these books are a direct reflection of that intensity that they are so popular. For people who are going through it, and for people who have gone through it, and for people who desperately want to go through it, this story speaks to them. So, while I may not agree with what I think the message of these books/movies is, and while my adult, rational, survivor-of-heartbreak self sees them as teen emotion porn, I have to admit that I do, in fact, understand the appeal. I wish I didn’t, but I do.
Ruminations on À Rebours
Where to start? As Oscar Wilde muses in Chapter 10 of The Picture of Dorian Gray
[Mild spoilers for À Rebours follow.]
À Rebours (or Against the Grain or Against Nature, depending on the translation) follows a middle-aged man by the name of Des Esseintes, who has experienced everything he believes life has to offer and is simply sick of it. He retreats to a home outside Paris and designs his life there so that he only has to have minimal interaction with his two servants.
Des Esseintes is fascinated with falsehood and the ways in which man has learned to imitate nature and, in his opinion often exceed it — from flowers to scents to jewels to colors. At one point, he decides he is in need of a trip to London, and after spending only an evening, decides that he’s had his fill, that his imagination had served up these images and experiences just as well if not better than the real thing, and he finds himself content to never leave his home away from civilization again.
Sadly for him, it comes to pass that his doctor (and numerous other specialists in nervous disorders, whom he consults when he is unhappy with his doctor’s prescription) insists that he move back to Paris and find a way to enjoy the company of others. Even this is anti-climactic. As distasteful as he finds the idea, he is deathly afraid of, well, death and illness. Thus he would rather be psychologically miserable than physically so.
This reaction to a life of excess, to having experienced everything he believes there is to experience, leads him to a life where he wants to experience nothing. He wants to ruminate, to remember, to analyze, but never to experience. In the most severe bouts of his illness, he even goes so far as to prefer nourishment via enema and is disappointed when his doctor prescribes a return to food.
[Spoilers for The Picture of Dorian Gray follow.]
Knowing the relation of the two novels (À Rebours is the unnamed novel delivered to Dorian Gray by Lord Henry Wotton, a novel Dorian himself calls poisonous), it’s practically impossible not to compare and contrast Des Esseintes and Dorian Gray. Dorian, of course, experiences none of the ravaging effects of the excessive lifestyle that Des Esseintes does. Even so, he does become bored and introverted and tired of society, though he never wishes to escape it in the way that Des Esseintes does.
Nonetheless, both men do tire of exploring the sin of gluttony, and, when they do, they take decidedly different paths. Dorian decides he wants to be a good person. He breaks off the affair he’s having with a young woman before it gets too serious for her to end up another Sibyl Vane. (It’s worth noting that, shortly after his shunning of Sibyl, he does in fact profess to want to become a good person. However, this is done out of fear and duty more than anything else. After all, at that point in Dorian’s life, there were still plenty of other, more immediately satisfying sensations to be had, and he was easily convinced to leave that conviction by the wayside.) Des Esseintes, it seems, never had much interest in becoming virtuous. Once he’d experienced everything he felt there was to experience, he gave way to sloth and apathy.
Their reactions to this aspect of their lives are telling. The gluttony of experience for Des Esseintes was a mere academic study. Dorian, on the other hand, was devoted to beauty and pleasure. Des Esseintes was a bored academic; Dorian was, essentially, a constantly fascinated hedonist.
The Effect of Beauty on Personality
Des Esseintes was a sickly child, but not uncared for. He received appropriate and above-standard care at the Jesuit school he attended as a youth. Because the emphasis for his success in life was always put on his intellect, he spent his efforts developing it. Despite his skepticism regarding the religious beliefs of his professors, he was very well respected for his mind and encouraged to think and explore for himself. Because of that, he was also resistant to influence. A man like Henry Wotton would likely have been an interesting companion for a time (before Des Esseintes bored of him), but he would never have had the influence on Des Esseintes that he was able to have on Dorian.
Dorian was beautiful, but unloved. It is not until he met Basil that he experienced any sort of adoration. Wotton only serves to further this emphasis on Dorian’s beauty (and youth) as his only perceived worth. Dorian is, in essence, a sort of cypher. He is a blank slate for other people’s philosophies and interests. Basil and Wotton praise his youth and beauty; he comes to believe he must treasure these things above all else. As a young man, very much a boy in so many ways, to have his first experiences with love and encouragement and being wanted be based on his looks, it is no wonder he makes the flippant oath that he does. After all, having known what is like to be without those feelings, it’s truly horrific for him, especially in his emotionally immature state, to imagine being without them once his youth and beauty fade.
Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Pride
Throughout the course of his life, Des Esseintes has to deal with illness and the failure of his body to comply with his desires. This culminates in what could have been a final blow to his pride: impotence. Even then, Des Esseintes takes no responsibility for his ails — neither physical nor social — instead choosing to blame genetics and the intellectual failings of others. There is never a moment where he wavers in his pride; instead, he retreats to a place where his pride will meet no challenges. He abandons the world because it doesn’t meet his standards. He sees his own intelligence as so far above the masses that he can’t bear even the smallest interaction. He simply recoils from anything that would challenge his pride. For a man so interested in questioning everything else, he never bothers to question himself, an act which makes him interesting but entirely unsympathetic.
Dorian, however, has no such refuge. In his own portrait, he sees how each of his actions should affect him, and he has to live with the knowledge that it hasn’t. This phenomenon is alternatingly horrifying and fascinating to him. In essence, he lives with the theoretical responsibility of his actions, but he has no physical or (for a very long time at least) social consequences. Because of this, there is a constant psychological tug of war going on in Dorian’s mind between the proof that his actions are depraved and the fact that he doesn’t have to suffer for them. Having never had any intrinsic pride instilled in him as a youth, as Des Esseintes had, he found his pride in extrinisic things: in others’ reactions to him, in his acquisition of beautiful things, and in the change of the painting. He is both massively proud of his ability to get away with the things he does (via the painting, not his own doing) and terribly ashamed of those same actions and behaviors. The final blow to his already tenuous pride, the thing that pushes him over the brink, is Wotton’s flippant assertion that he is, essentially, a lost cause. To hear from his mentor, the architect of so much of his psyche, his constant source of encouragement, that there is no hope for him or his soul? It’s the last push over the edge for a mind that had always been unsure, emotional, impetuous, and desperate for approval.
It’s likely Des Esseintes would have found Dorian to be rather simpering, too emotional, and, frankly, annoying. Dorian is sort of like the little brother, trying very hard to be like his older sibling, but never quite succeeding. However, it’s for those very reasons that I connected so strongly with Dorian’s story. I was intrigued by Des Esseintes, but there was no emotional connection to the man. He was interesting but entirely unlikeable. Sure, I could understand some of his views; I even agreed with some of them. We see him struggle against his health, against others, but he never looks inside himself. He was an interesting man, but I didn’t care for him. In that way, Dorian is his inverse. I was invested in Dorian; I wanted him to rise above his influences. Watching his descent was difficult enough, but my heart broke when Wotton crushed his last hope. In the end, though, they both died (or at least it can be assumed in Des Esseintes’ case) as they lived: Des Esseintes, bitterly and stubbornly misanthropic in the only company he could tolerate — his own; and Dorian, passionately, impetuously, and tragically yearning for something he could never obtain.
Ruminations on A Doll’s House
There are certain things I miss about school. One is the opportunity to truly delve into an analysis of literature. It’s something that’s hard to do in a vacuum and without guidance. Outside of school, there are few places of which I’m aware in which to discuss literature at an academic level and fewer places where any sort of essay would find an audience.
However, since I have neither the time nor the money to go back to school for a master’s in English literature at the moment, and since I have this little blog here that’s all my own, I’m going to start posting a bit of literary analysis from time to time. I welcome anyone and everyone to weigh in on the concepts, whether you’ve read the work in question or not. Of course, there will likely be spoilers in all of these Literary Analysis posts, so proceed with caution if you care.
There are stories that retain a sort of permanence of themes and reactions in my life, and then there’s Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House. I’ve now read this play three times: first in high school, again in college, and just recently after my 18-year-old sister raved about it. Her reaction was entirely different than my own at that age, so I figured I owed it another shot.
In high school, I hated Nora for her lack of independence, feeling she’d brought her troubles upon herself. You teach people how to treat you, after all.
In college, I hated Nora for her lack of moral values. Her seemingly flippant and selfish abandonment of her husband and children was practically blasphemous to me.
Now, I offer you this.
In Defense of Nora Helmer
A Doll’s House is an exploration in how identity influences the way we relate to people. Nora’s upbringing is a little murky, but it’s clear she grew up in a household with problems. Her father apparently had legal or financial issues that Torvald was able to ameliorate, more or less in exchange for Nora’s hand in marriage. As a child and a young woman, she was never encouraged to think for herself, and she never really sought to. Life was prettier and easier on the surface; let someone else deal with the dark underbelly. Nora’s strength was in her heart, not her mind. Her actions at the end of the play might lead a casual reader to believe otherwise, but Nora is a warning in what happens when a person focuses all devotion and care on others without ever learning to know oneself.
Without the drama of life with her father, Nora settles into a comfortable but entirely superficial existence. Her relationship with Torvald is superficial: she’s an entertainment to him, not a companion. Her relationship with her children is superficial: she’s a playmate, not a caretaker. Her relationship with Dr. Rank is superficial: she’s an object to him, not a friend. Her life is all show and no substance — until Torvald is taken ill, that is.
She jumps at the chance to do something real, something with consequence, something that is completely and utterly her own doing. However, because she does not have the savvy to do the research (she’s never had to do such a thing before), she forges a signature to procure a loan, not realizing how serious a grievance that is. Still, there’s something of a delight for her in having a deep, dark secret. It gives her roots. There’s nothing superificial about owing creditors and having to sneak money from one’s husband, and she thrives on it. She also takes great pride in and credit for having sacrificed to save her husband’s life.
Even so, Nora is never truly in danger until Krogstad arrives. The feeling of actual danger, of being able to do nothing to keep one’s life from being ripped away, throws her into a frenzy unlike anything she’s ever experienced. The little deception isn’t fun anymore. She doesn’t understand why no one is playing along. It is through this that she begins to understand that, not only is there a world outside of her little life, but that she has no idea how it works. And that realization causes her to see the cracks in the foundation of her own house.
Through most of the third act, we are led to believe that Nora is considering suicide because she is afraid to face up to the consequences. Something I missed in my first two read-throughs, or at least something that didn’t hit quite like it did in my third, is that she was doing it for Torvald, not for herself. She was throwing herself on the pyre to save Torvald’s reputation. She was willing to sacrifice her life as a final act of devotion to Torvald. She fully expected him to still love her, to still want her, perhaps even more so for what she’d done and what she’d been through. She was certain he would protect her. And because of her faith in Torvald’s love, she was willing to put forth the ultimate sacrifice to save him.
But when it comes down to it, Torvald lets her down — and in the worst possible way. In the moments between when he reads Krogstad’s first letter of demands and when he sees Krogstad’s second letter recalling the first, Torvald essentially shuns Nora, says his love for her is gone, but they’ll have to stay together to keep up appearances. To add insult to injury, he tells her she won’t be able to see her children, that she’s not fit to raise them. There is no concern for her whatsoever; he is only interested in damage control. That he could turn on her so quickly and then turn back with a snap of his fingers is all the proof Nora needs to prove that she knows nothing about anything at all. The thing of which she was most sure in the world — Torvald’s love — was nothing but a sham.
Knowing this, she chooses to move forward with eyes open. She realizes she knows nothing, and she’s not content with that. She chooses to stand on her own, to think, to question, to learn. In short, she chooses to become a full person, and an adult one at that. There is no sin in this. The only real criticism that can be leveled at Nora is the manner in which she chooses to pursue these goals.
Throughout the play, Nora is shown to be rather impulsive, whether its her proclivity for sneaking macaroons or her quick-changing emotions. In the final moments of the play, she is no different. She takes little time to think about the consequences of her actions on others, perhaps for fear that she would talk herself out of leaving. She dashes any hope for reconciliation and essentially declines the opportunity for Torvald to make any amends whatsoever. Her words toward Torvald border on cruel, but they are no worse than what he inflicted on her only moments earlier. He shattered her world, and, while her coldness toward him is not exactly virtuous, it’s certainly understandable.
Personally, my only real, unresolvable qualm is her abandonment of her children. Without the benefit of knowing the basics of child psychology, it’s understandable how she justifies this. It’s my hope that, in the fictional world of life beyond the last pages of A Doll’s House, Nora comes to realize that her children do need to know her and that she does have something to offer them, and that something is worked out to that end.
Having significantly more life experience under my belt than the last time I read it, and, frankly, quite a different worldview, I was much more able to identify with Nora. The choice to give up the life you imagined for yourself is never an easy one, no matter how right it is. Seeing the cracks in the façade is painful, and realizing they stem from the foundation itself is downright heartbreaking. Patches can be applied to hide the damage, but things can only get worse until the entire house begins to crumble. Nora realizes she can either die as the home collapses upon her, or she can get out and rebuild. She makes the brave and difficult choice. She doesn’t do it perfectly, but she does it the best she can. And I can no longer fault her for that.
