Sample Response: How and why might two of the works you have

studied be considered inspirational?

The plays A Doll’s House and The Crucible provide social commentary
which can be considered as inspirational in the context of their temporal
and societal publication. Henrik Ibsen’s three-act play, A Doll’s House
was written and set in Norway during the 1870s. It presents the events
and reveals conflicts within the setting of the Helmer household, leading
in its charged final scene to Nora’s departure from her domestic
entrapment in search of an autonomous life. The ending, controversial in
the period, seems to support Ibsen’s support for women’s rights, raising
important questions about how social and cultural practices constrain
and determine the lives of both men and women. Arthur Miller’s The
Crucible was written almost a century after the publication of Ibsen’s
work. Published in 1953, it is set in 1692 Salem, Massachusetts during
the period of the Salem Witch Trials. While Ibsen creates ‘composite
characters’ indicative of his period, Miller bases his play on real events,
creating an allegory that portrays the mob-mentality and hysteria
perpetrated by McCarthyism and the Red Scare. Both plays are social
commentaries, and both plays lay bare societal problems. A Doll’s
House establishes Nora as a role model, a strong emancipated woman
who inspires others to seek their own freedom and agency. Similarly, in
The Crucible, it is characterisation that inspires readers and viewers.
John Proctor and Reverend Hale are both strong characters who
criticize and stand against the hypocritical abuses of the Salem
theocracy. Of course, for both Nora and John, their choices have a high
cost: Nora loses access to her children and financial security, and John
loses his life.

In A Doll’s House, Ibsen uses the inspirational character of Nora to

suggest the possibility that women can escape the patriarchal norms of
society. To do this, Ibsen initially presents Nora as a representation of
the archetypal subservient housewife. The play opens and remains
within the confines of a domestic space, and the initial stage directions
confirm that the play is likely to be a conventional domestic drama. The
first exchanges between Nora and her husband, Torvald, at the opening
of the first act seemingly confirm the viewer’s sense of a domestic play
portraying predictable gender roles. Torvald’s use of bird imagery and
possessive pronouns in addressing Nora are playful and apparently
loving, but they underscore the sense that Nora is the possession of her

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 ation)
husband. The bird imagery connotes a sense that Nora is beautiful, full
of elegant movement, and possibly possessed of a fine singing voice.
Darker readings are possible, although improbable in the opening
scenes; it is also possible to interpret the bird imagery as connoting an
erratic quality in Nora, or to illustrate her entrapment, where the ‘caged
bird’ is a commonplace trope in feminist literature. The plays gender-
power differences are reinforced in the way props are used in the play.
For example, there is an apparent parallelism between the ornaments
Nora puts on the Christmas tree and herself. The ornaments are the
decorative possession of the tree, and this is an arrangement that is
analogous to Nora’s relationship with Torvald. In the initial scenes, Nora
appears as a “stupid child” unlike Torvald who is “a real human being”
and “proud of being a man”. It becomes increasingly clear to the
audience that despite Torvald’s high social status (he is a bank
manager) and the material comforts he provides Nora, she is just
another one of Torvald’s possessions, not unlike the piano that is a
centrepiece in their home.

Following the initial exchange between Nora and Ms Linde, a different

view of Nora begins to become apparent. Her movement and body
language (indicated in the stage directions) assume greater confidence.
Following the revelation of Nora’s secret bank loan, taken for the
purpose of saving Torvald’s life, the theatre audience recognizes Nora’s
agency, as a woman who can act independently. It is possible that,
although in contradiction to patriarchal law, the audience understands
Nora’s selflessness, and it is this that may inspire the audience – and
not least women – to an understanding of their own lives and the
potential to escape society’s suffocating patriarchy. In the third act,
Nora’s costume change from her sexually alluring tarantella dress to
outdoor clothing symbolizes Nora’s epiphany and foreshadows her
eventual separation from Torvald. This change of costume suggests that
Nora has concluded that she no longer wants to be “a wife and mother”
who “performs tricks”. The play’s resolution and Nora’s departure from
her domestic entrapment deviate from the happy ending of traditional
‘well-made plays’ that work to reaffirm societal norms. It is in this sense
that Nora’s final slamming of the door – made clear in the stage
directions and shocking for European audiences of the period – offers
inspiration to women who feel entrapped in their roles as wives and
primary caregivers. In the play, Nora undergoes character development.
That is, in her ultimate refusal to be Torvald’s “doll-wife” in the same way

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she was her father’s “doll-child”, Nora becomes “first and foremost […] a
human being.” It is this possibility of change that can inspire others.

Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible is, like Ibsen’s play, a canonical work of
literature that uses characterisation as a vehicle to inspire others to
positive social change, even where the costs of individual bravery comes
at enormous personal cost. It is mainly through the character of John
Proctor that Miller draws attention to the absurdity of hysterical mob-
mentality, inspiring others to fight abuses of others and remain true to
themselves. In the play, despite John’s crime of lechery, his relationship
with his wife, Elizabeth, remains strong, and he does everything in his
power to save his wife. Proctor is an inspiration to the play’s audience
precisely because he tells the truth by confessing to his crime of
adultery. Like Nora Helmer, John Procter challenges power although the
outcome of doing so will not favour them. And, like Nora, John is
insistent on establishing for himself an authentic identity. The
exclamatory sentences in his speech where he says “because it is my
name! Because I will not have another in my life!” both illustrates his
despair and his sense of resoluteness as he is prepared to condemn
himself but refuses to taint the reputation of others. Here, again, we see
similarities to Nora in that both characters are able to put the interests of
others before their own in the pursuit of a greater good. The metaphor
that John is “not worth the dust on the shoes of them that hang”
indicates how he is unprepared to compromise his integrity and
reputation to save his life. In a pathos-laden moment as the play
concludes, Proctor says “I have given you my soul; leave me my name!”
Here, Miller seems to reprimand the mob mentality that exists in the play
and in wider society, and he denounces the hysteria that only one
character, Abigail, has managed to create.

Another character who inspires the audience, because he is the

antithesis of hysteria, is Hale. Hale – Miller’s dialogue and stage
directions make clear – is a voice of reason in the play, a man who
seeks evidence, understanding that many of the accusations are false.
Miller characterises Hale as an intelligent, learned man, made obvious
by his books and hand props. As Proctor says to Hale, looking at his
books, “my, they’re heavy!” It is Hale who questions Giles’ guilt, unlike
Hale’s foil, Parris, who exclaims that the new proof is “an attack upon the
court!” The audience is inspired by Hale because he shows
determination. Although he storms off stage at the end of Act 2, he does
not give up and returns to help by praying with the “guilty”.

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The allegory that draws parallels between the Salem witch trials and the
Red Scare allows Miller to comment on McCarthy’s regime by inspiring
hi audience to seek and defend the truth. Miller, himself a witness at the
HUAC trials, understood that McCarthyism was not about an attempt to
defend the United States. Instead, it was motivated by ambition and
vendettas. It is this that is represented in The Crucible and it is this that
he seeks to inspire others to fight against.

Although written in different times and focused on different social issues,

the two plays, A Doll’s House and The Crucible, have much in common.
It is dialogue, props, and stage directions that, in different ways,
construct fictional worlds. But, the fictional worlds have real world
equivalents. It is the development of principal characters – in particular
Nora and John Proctor – brave in the face of powerful obstacles, that
drive both plays towards their final curtain. The plays inspired their
audiences when they were first performed, and they continue to do so
today. Many people continue to be persecuted for their political beliefs
and many women around the world, including in my own country,
continue to experience domestic entrapment and abuse.

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