A Doll S House Alternate Ending

A Doll's House ends an abrupt slamming of the door. Nora decides to abandon her husband and kids, and takes off into the snow to make her own way in the world. That is a very bold decision. I might even call it foolish: she doesn't have a job, not a whole lot of skills, no home, no prospects and no money. By her own admission she can’t make any choices by herself so she goes ahead and makes this drastic pronouncement. By making this determination, she's ostracizing herself from the society she's always been a part of. Most "respectable" people just aren't going to socialize with her. The comfortable life she's leading will be totally destroyed. So, why does she do such a thing?

I can’t change anything, though, about the ending to the story because it would be just like Nora to do something stupid in the hopes of making life better. She had done that already to get herself in this situation. She has resolved to remove herself from the home. There is nothing in the play that would support Nora making a rational decision. But is there any hope for Torvald and Nora getting back together?

The last line of the play leaves it open to suggest that maybe there is. Torvald is alone in the living room. Stage directions tell us that, "A hope flashes across his mind" and then Torvald says, "The most wonderful thing of all?" He's referring to the conversation he and Nora had right before she walked out of the room. Nora says that if they're ever to be more than strangers "the most wonderful thing of all would have to happen" that their "life together would be a real wedlock." So, has Torvald realized what this means? Has he figured out that they both have to respect each other as individuals in order to have a real marriage? Has he realized what he has to do? Ibsen doesn't tell us for sure. Maybe Torvald runs out into the snow and makes it all better. The sound of the door shutting below is Torvald running out the door. Besides it doesn’t seem like Nora to go slamming