Christine is an old friend of Nora, widowed and penniless. She is an example of what Nora could be like without marriage and its security. They are two obvious example, perhaps by deliberate by Ibsen, of how their lives have been so influenced by the patriarchy and the male control figures they have had. The desperate reaction from Nora of her ‘shameful’ situation draws similarities to the impact of the patriarchy on the major female characters in ‘Hamlet’. For example, Ophelia is shown to be an obedient and loyal daughter, yet she is only seen as valuable in terms of her family’s honour and is used as a ‘pawn’ in Hamlets game of madness. When her father is killed, Ophelia is driven mad. Is this because the control figures in her life have gone and she is afraid of the unknown? In the article by Carol Thomas Neely, “’Documents in Madness’: Reading Madness and Gender in Shakespeare’s Tragedies and Early Modern Culture”, Ophelia’s madness is quoted as it being “her liberation from silence, obedience, and constraint or her absolute victimization by patriarchal oppression”. This is an interesting view on how the sudden loss of both her guardian, Polonius, has affected
Christine is an old friend of Nora, widowed and penniless. She is an example of what Nora could be like without marriage and its security. They are two obvious example, perhaps by deliberate by Ibsen, of how their lives have been so influenced by the patriarchy and the male control figures they have had. The desperate reaction from Nora of her ‘shameful’ situation draws similarities to the impact of the patriarchy on the major female characters in ‘Hamlet’. For example, Ophelia is shown to be an obedient and loyal daughter, yet she is only seen as valuable in terms of her family’s honour and is used as a ‘pawn’ in Hamlets game of madness. When her father is killed, Ophelia is driven mad. Is this because the control figures in her life have gone and she is afraid of the unknown? In the article by Carol Thomas Neely, “’Documents in Madness’: Reading Madness and Gender in Shakespeare’s Tragedies and Early Modern Culture”, Ophelia’s madness is quoted as it being “her liberation from silence, obedience, and constraint or her absolute victimization by patriarchal oppression”. This is an interesting view on how the sudden loss of both her guardian, Polonius, has affected