LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Volume 12 : 6 June 2012
ISSN 1930-2940

Managing Editor: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
Editors: B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
         Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
         B. A. Sharada, Ph.D.
         A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
         Lakhan Gusain, Ph.D.
         Jennifer Marie Bayer, Ph.D.
         S. M. Ravichandran, Ph.D.
         G. Baskaran, Ph.D.
         L. Ramamoorthy, Ph.D.
Assistant Managing Editor: Swarna Thirumalai, M.A.

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The Identity In-Between: The Enquiry of Apathy and Existential Anguish in Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House

Abdur Rahman Shahin, M.A. in English
Rizwan-ul Huq, M.A. in Language and Culture in Europe

Abstract

Henrik Ibsen, a champion of modern theatre movement, is an ardent advocate of self-freedom, self-emancipation, and self-control. A Doll’s House is not an exception to this literary tradition as it shelves the contrasts between individuality and social values. Quite interestingly, ‘Ibsenite’ plays address these troubling issues of contemporary Victorian dualities. The project of European Enlightenment and its subsequent avalanche effects are truly represented through these plays where the classic and modern minds are in duels, fighting each other to the claws without any conclusive, authoritative solutions. Nora, the character representing the rebellion of the ‘New Women’, shares this crisis of her identity, a character torn between the traditional values and the urging necessity of the metamorphic transformation. Thus, the slamming of the door echoes the tension between the dualities of mind, an endeavor of self-searching quest. The paper investigates the existential phenomena of the issue examining the traces of metamorphosis and its aftermath.

Key words: enlightenment, identity, existential anguish, metamorphosis, new women, dollydom.

1. Introduction

The development of Western History is identically allied with the project of Enlightenment and its aftermath. The project of European Enlightenment, which has been geared up by this new wave of revolutionary industrial achievements, was quite trapped into a quagmire of debate, degeneration and moral deficiency at the very beginning of the twentieth century. The radical debate of fin de siècle (Ledger, 79) is quite contentiously revolving around the tables and the tea cups, as if the civilization is at the very end of its down-end collapse. A significant crack was developing between the traditional values and the new-coined ‘ism’s. The era of peace, stability and assured intellectuality is shattering into pieces questioning the classical values or clichés of chivalry, heroism, tradition, authority, and control.

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.

Abdur Rahman Shahin, M.A in English
Assistant Professor
English Discipline
Khulna University
Khulna
Bangladesh 9208 arahmanku@yahoo.com

Rizwan-ul Huq, M.A. in Language and Culture in Europe (Corresponding Author)
Lecturer
Department of English
Bangladesh University
Dhaka
Bangladesh 1207
rizhu053@student.liu.se
rizwannulhuq@yahoo.com
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