Act 1 Close Reading - Nora and Mrs Linde
Act 1 Close Reading - Nora and Mrs Linde
Act 1 Close Reading - Nora and Mrs Linde
NORA.
But the whole point was that he mustn’t know! Great heavens, don’t you see?
He hadn’t to know how dangerously ill he was. It was me they told that his
life was in danger and that only going to a warm climate could save him. Do
you suppose I didn’t try to think of other ways of getting him down there? I
told him how wonderful it would be for me to go abroad like other young
wives; I cried and prayed; I asked him to remember my condition, and said he
ought to be nice and tender to me; and then I suggested he might quite easily
borrow the money. But then he got almost angry with me, Christine. He said I
was frivolous, and that it was his duty as a husband not to pander to my
moods and caprices – I think that’s what he called them. Well, well, I thought,
you’ve got to be saved somehow. And then I thought of a way –
MRS LINDE.
But didn’t your husband find out from your father that the money hadn’t
come from him?
NORA.
No, never. Papa died just then. I’d thought of letting him into the plot and
asking him not to tell. But since he was so ill -- ! And as things turned out, t
didn’t become necessary.
MRS. LINDE.
And you’ve never told your husband about this?
NORA.
For heaven’s sake, no! What an idea! He’s frightfully strict about such
matters. And besides – he’s so proud of being a man – it’d be so painful and
humiliating for him to know that he owed anything to me. It’d completely
wreck our relationship. This life we have build together would not longer
exist.
MRS. LINDE.
Will you never tell him?
Guiding Questions
1. Where do you see Nora’s internal struggle surface in her speeches? What is she fighting?
2. To what extent are both characters playing their part in society?