Explore the theme of death and rebirth in Ibsen’s A Doll’s House
...use and specifically when the children enter and play hide & seek in Act I. So whatever resulting love is left from Torvald is now completely superficial, and Nora is left as another one of Torvald's possessions. The arrival of Krogstad to talk with Nora about the job at the bank where Helmer works brings a change in the atmosphere, as his presence and his needs to talk with Nora annoy Helmer. In Act I, the Helmers’ marriage reflects Torvald's preoccupation towards his social image. This can be seen when Nora is speaking of Torvald and says, He's so strict on that subject. Besides -Torvald, with all his masculine pride- how painfully humiliating for him if he ever found out he was in debt to me. That would just ruin our relationship. Our beautiful, happy home would never be the same. Dr. Rank is another character who is involves in the theme of death. He has declared to her his love, and we come to know that the love each other. This will lead to a conflict and a change for Nora as Dr. Rank dies of health problems, causing her to modify her attitude as she is left alone with no one to care for her really. The second Act starts on Christmas day. The image of the Christmas tree stripped and dishevelled, with the stamps of burnt-out candles portrays a sense of decay. The change of the tree, from the bright one to the declining one, is parallel to the change in Nora’s mood. Nora's marriage is in tatters and will only last a short while. The Tarantella dance is linked to the climax of the play where the death and rebirth of Nora is presented. From its origins, the dance is considered to be used supposedly to cure the bite of the spider which would eventually lead to death. Nora is pictured as if a spider had beaten her, which was why she wishes to die. But when she danced the Tarantella she seems to be cured of her depression and she experiences a rebirth as a totally different person. As Nora dances widely, Helmer states But, Nora darling, you’re dancing as if your life depended on it! and Nora responds affirmative to it. The life of Nora depends on this dance; as she dances her life begins to change into another. This is the climax of the play, when both the theme of death and rebirth connect with each other and show that the old Nora dies literally to give birth to the new one. A legend tells that the bite of the spider is presumed to make a person hallucinate. The town folks would play music and the afflicted person would dance to ward off the spider’s venom. Others say that when the person was bitten, the venom would make him or her move about as if dancing. There is another story related to the dance, women working in the fields, were bitten by the Tarantula spider would dance off the venom. It is said that having been found that profuse perspiration, which seemed to force the poison out through the pores of the body, was the only remedy for the bite of this venomous spider. Then, experiments discovered that music was the only incentive sufficient to stimulate the unhappy sufferers to action. This dance divides Nora’s life with her future. She is now prepared to die. In the middle of the dance Nora goes away to change of costume. In Act III, while talking to Torvald, she describes how when she was a child she was expected to subscribe to all her father's opinions, and to keep her own to herself. When she married, this role was transferred to Torvald. Nora admits that she has pretended to do it and to think as Torvald thinks, but that she has never been happy. She feels that Torvald has been kind to her, but has treated her like a...