This essay examines moral and social consciousness in Henrik Ibsen's "A Doll's House" and Charlotte Perkins Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper," focusing on how both female protagonists confront the injustices of Victorian society. The paper analyzes Nora's decision to abandon her family in pursuit of selfhood, Krogstad's moral redemption, and the unnamed narrator's descent into madness as acts of resistance against social constraint. Drawing on multiple literary critics, the essay argues that both women pay an enormous personal price for their defiance, and that the contrasting portrayals by a male and a female author reveal divergent perspectives on women's autonomy during the period.
The essay demonstrates comparative literary analysis: two texts are read side by side around a common thematic framework (moral consciousness and resistance to social norms). Rather than treating each work in isolation, the writer consistently returns to points of similarity and contrast, culminating in a meta-critical insight about how each author's gender shapes reader sympathy for the protagonist.
The paper opens with a thematic framing paragraph, then devotes two body paragraphs to "A Doll's House" (Nora's arc and Krogstad's subplot) and one to "The Yellow Wallpaper." A comparative paragraph follows, drawing explicit parallels and contrasts between the two works and their authors. The conclusion synthesizes the shared thematic argument about isolation, moral struggle, and societal cost. This creates a clear funnel structure: individual texts → comparison → broader social commentary.
This essay examines moral and social consciousness in service to others as depicted in A Doll's House by Henrik Ibsen and "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Both stories raise issues of moral and social consciousness and make the reader more aware of how society viewed and treated women during the Victorian Age. Each protagonist must conquer obstacles and fight for what she believes is right, even when doing so goes against the culture and belief systems of the time.
In A Doll's House, Nora is pampered and childlike in her existence with Torvald. She lies to her husband rather than being honest with him, creating tension in their marriage — tension that Torvald only deepens by treating her like a child. He calls her a "silly girl," and one of her small acts of defiance is eating macaroons to spite him. Early in the play, Torvald refers to his wife as a "lark," a "squirrel," and "the little sweet-tooth." She is certainly not a fully realized or independent woman, and yet she ultimately chooses what is right for herself rather than for her family. At the end of the play, she does something unimaginable for the time: she stands up to her husband and leaves him in order to find herself.
As one critic observes of her reaction to Torvald's violent outburst: "She, on the other hand, who had believed that he would appreciate the devotion underlying her act and would even be prepared to take the responsibility for it upon himself, feels all the props of her moral existence knocked from under her" (Downs 111). She suddenly recognizes that she has been wronged, and in order to fight for what is right, she must desert everything she has ever known and begin again.
Another dimension of A Doll's House also speaks to the fight for what is right and to social responsibility. Krogstad wants to begin his new relationship with Mrs. Linde with complete openness, and so he chooses to destroy the devastating letter and cancel the note for the loan that Nora still owes. As one critic explains, "Krogstad's destruction of the incriminating paper proceeds from his wish to begin their new venture on a basis of perfect openness and virtue. (The change of intention has a bearing on what might be called the main moral plot)" (Downs 111). Both Krogstad and Nora therefore find a need for moral and spiritual consciousness: Krogstad acts to begin a new life free of regrets, while Nora acts because she recognizes she can never be a whole person if she remains with Torvald.
There is, however, another moral obligation Nora appears to set aside — her children. One critic raises the difficult question: "[H]ow it could ever be possible for any woman with the maternal instinct fully developed to desert her children because her pride was wounded?" (Egan 102). This question goes unanswered in the play, and it casts a shadow over Nora's response to her situation. She ultimately concludes that her first obligation is to herself, and she accepts the price that both she and her children will pay.
In "The Yellow Wallpaper," the narrator also pays a heavy price. She escapes her empty and unsatisfying existence by descending into complete madness. She rationally understands that those around her are pushing her toward this state when she writes: "John is a physician, and perhaps — (I would not say it to a living soul, of course, but this is dead paper and a great relief to my mind) — perhaps that is one reason I do not get well faster. You see he does not believe I am sick!" (Gilman).
There is also a question as to whether the narrator draws her husband along with her in her journey into madness. Two feminist critics observe: "At the moment when Gilman's narrator completes the identification with her double in the wallpaper, she experiences an epiphany. To John she exclaims, 'I've got out at last… In spite of you and Jane!'" (Delashmit and Long 33). She has realized her freedom, but at an enormous cost. Like Nora, she leaves behind a child and a husband in order to inhabit her private "mad" world. Some critics argue that she is the product of a "sick" society that treats women so inhumanely they are left with few options beyond deserting their families or going mad (Herndl 114). The cost to the women and their families is clearly extreme, and the obstacles they face after claiming their freedom are equally daunting. The narrator will likely never regain full sanity, and even if she does, her husband will never believe she is "cured" or capable. Nora may never return to her family, and she will encounter tremendous obstacles attempting to support herself at a time when few middle- or upper-class women worked outside the home.
Both women fought for what they knew was right at a time when women were literally kept behind closed doors. Both could perceive the wrongs and injustices in society, and both believed there had to be something more for them elsewhere. The narrator pays the highest price because she surrenders both her sanity and her family, and she faces the greatest obstacles to any semblance of a normal life.
It is noteworthy that the male author, Ibsen, creates a character whose decision to leave can seem irrational, while the female author, Gilman, creates a character who remains deeply sympathetic even as madness overtakes her. This contrast reveals just how differently male and female perspectives were constructed at the time. Both women fight and speak out against injustice, yet they are viewed differently even by their own authors.
Herndl, Diane Price. Invalid Women: Figuring Feminine Illness in American Fiction and Culture, 1840–1940. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1993.
Ibsen, Henrik. "A Doll's House." Project Gutenberg, 2002.
You’re 82% through this paper. Sign up to read the remaining 2 sections.
Sign Up Now — Instant Access Already a member? Log inAlways verify citation format against your institution’s current style guide requirements.