Recasting "A Doll House": Narcissism As Character Motivation in Ibsen's Play
Author(s): Carol Strongin Tufts
Source: Comparative Drama, Vol. 20, No. 2 (Summer 1986), pp. 140-159
Published by: Comparative Drama
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/41153229
Accessed: 15-10-2018 19:22 UTC
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Recasting A Doll House:
Narcissism As Character Motivation
in Ibsen's Play
Carol Strongin Tufts
I am not a member of the Women's Rights League. Whatever
I have written has been without any conscious thought of making
propaganda. I have been more the poet and less the social philoso-
pher than people generally seem inclined to believe. ... To me
it has seemed a problem of mankind in general. And if you read
my books carefully you will understand this. . . . My task has
been the description of humanity. To be sure, whenever such a
description is felt to be reasonably true, the reader will read his
own feelings and sentiments into the work of the poet. These are
then attributed to the poet; but incorrectly so. Every reader re-
molds the work beautifully and neatly, each according to his own
personality. Not only those who write but also those who read are
poets. They are collaborators. 1
To look again at Ibsen's famous and often-quoted words -
his assertion that A Doll House was not intended as propaganda
to promote the cause of women's rights - is to realize the
sarcasm aimed by the playwright at those nineteenth-century
"collaborators" who insisted on viewing his play as a treatise
and Nora, his heroine, as the romantic standard-bearer for the
feminist cause. Yet there is also a certain irony implicit in such
a realization, for directors, actors, audiences, and critics turning
to this play a little over one hundred years after its first per-
formance bring with them the historical, cultural, and psycho-
logical experience which itself places them in the role of Ibsen's
collaborators. Because it is a theatrical inevitability that each
dramatic work which survives its time and place of first per-
CAROL STRONGIN TUFTS is Assistant Professor of English at Oberlin College.
She has published on Chekhov, and an article on Shakespeare's Macbeth is forth-
coming. She is currently at work on an extended study of ...
Play hard learn harder: The Serious Business of Play
Recasting A Doll House Narcissism As Character Motivat.docx
1. Recasting "A Doll House": Narcissism As Character Motivation
in Ibsen's Play
Author(s): Carol Strongin Tufts
Source: Comparative Drama, Vol. 20, No. 2 (Summer 1986), pp.
140-159
Published by: Comparative Drama
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/41153229
Accessed: 15-10-2018 19:22 UTC
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars,
researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information
technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about
JSTOR, please contact [email protected]
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the
Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms
Comparative Drama is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize,
preserve and extend access to
Comparative Drama
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Recasting A Doll House:
Narcissism As Character Motivation
in Ibsen's Play
Carol Strongin Tufts
I am not a member of the Women's Rights League. Whatever
I have written has been without any conscious thought of
making
propaganda. I have been more the poet and less the social
philoso-
pher than people generally seem inclined to believe. ... To me
it has seemed a problem of mankind in general. And if you read
my books carefully you will understand this. . . . My task has
been the description of humanity. To be sure, whenever such a
description is felt to be reasonably true, the reader will read his
own feelings and sentiments into the work of the poet. These
are
then attributed to the poet; but incorrectly so. Every reader re-
molds the work beautifully and neatly, each according to his
own
personality. Not only those who write but also those who read
are
poets. They are collaborators. 1
To look again at Ibsen's famous and often-quoted words -
his assertion that A Doll House was not intended as propaganda
to promote the cause of women's rights - is to realize the
3. sarcasm aimed by the playwright at those nineteenth-century
"collaborators" who insisted on viewing his play as a treatise
and Nora, his heroine, as the romantic standard-bearer for the
feminist cause. Yet there is also a certain irony implicit in such
a realization, for directors, actors, audiences, and critics
turning
to this play a little over one hundred years after its first per-
formance bring with them the historical, cultural, and psycho-
logical experience which itself places them in the role of
Ibsen's
collaborators. Because it is a theatrical inevitability that each
dramatic work which survives its time and place of first per-
CAROL STRONGIN TUFTS is Assistant Professor of English
at Oberlin College.
She has published on Chekhov, and an article on Shakespeare's
Macbeth is forth-
coming. She is currently at work on an extended study of
Chekhov's major plays.
140
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2018 19:22:22 UTC
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Carol Strongin Tufts 141
formance does so to be recast in productions mounted in
succeeding times and different places, A Doll House can never
so much be simply reproduced as it must always be re-envi-
sioned. And if the spectacle of a woman walking out on her
husband and children in order to fulfill her "duties to [herjself '
is no longer the shock for us today that it was for audiences at
4. the end of the nineteenth century, a production of A Doll
House which resonates with as much immediacy and power for
us as it did for its first audiences may do so through the
discovery within Ibsen's text of something of our own time and
place. For in A Doll House, as Rolf Fjelde has written, "[i]t is
the entire house . . . which is on trial, the total complex of
relationships, including husband, wife, children, servants, up-
stairs and downstairs, that is tested by the visitors that come
and go, embodying aspects of the inescapable reality outside."2
And a production which approaches that reality through the
experience of Western culture in the last quarter of the
twentieth
century may not only discover how uneasy was Ibsen's relation-
ship to certain aspects of the forces of Romanticism at work in
his own society, but, in so doing, may also come to fashion a
Doll House which shifts emphasis away from the celebration of
the Romantic belief in the sovereignty of the individual to the
revelation of an isolating narcissism - a narcissism that has
become all too familiar to us today. 3
The characters of A Doll House are, to be sure, not alone
in dramatic literature in being self-preoccupied, for self-pre-
occupation is a quality shared by characters from Oedipus to
Hamlet and on into modern drama. Yet if a contemporary
production is to suggest the narcissistic self-absorption of
Ibsen's
characters, it must do so in such a way as to imply motivations
for their actions and delineate their relationships with one
another. Thus it is important to establish a conceptual frame-
work which will provide a degree of precision for the use of the
term 'narcissism' in this discussion so as to distinguish it from
the kind of self-absorption which is an inherent quality neces-
sarily shared by all dramatic characters. For that purpose, it is
useful to turn to the criteria established by the Task Force on
Nomenclature and Statistics of the American Psychiatric Asso-
ciation for diagnosing the narcissistic personality:
5. A. Grandiose sense of self-importance and uniqueness, e.g.,
exag-
gerates achievements and talents, focuses on how special one's
problems are.
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142 Comparative Drama
B. Preoccupation with fantasies of unlimited success, power,
bril-
liance, beauty, or ideal love.
C. Exhibitionistic: requires constant attention and admiration.
D. Responds to criticism, indifference of others, or defeat with
either cool indifference, or with marked feelings of rage,
inferi-
ority, shame, humiliation, or emptiness.
E. At least two of the following are characteristics of
disturbances
in interpersonal relationships:
(1) Lack of empathy: inability to recognize how others feel,
e.g., unable to appreciate the distress of someone who is
seriously ill.
(2) Entitlement: expectation of special favors without assum-
ing reciprocal responsibilities, e.g., surprise and anger that
people won't do what he wants.
6. (3) Interpersonal exploita veness : takes advantage of others to
indulge own desires for self-aggrandizement, with disre-
gard for the personal integrity and rights of others.
(4) Relationships characteristically vacillate between the ex-
tremes of over-idealization and devaluation.4
These criteria, as they provide a background against which to
consider Nora's relationship with both Kristine Linde and
Dr. Rank, will serve to illuminate not only those relationships
themselves, but also the relationship of Nora and her husband
which is at the center of the play. Moreover, if these criteria
are viewed as outlines for characterization - but not as
reductive
psychoanalytic constructs leading to "case studies" - it becomes
possible to discover a Nora of greater complexity than the
totally
sympathetic victim turned romantic heroine who has inhabited
most productions of the play. And, most important of all, as
Nora and her relationships within the walls of her "doll house"
come to imply a paradigm of the dilemma of all human rela-
tionships in the greater society outside, the famous sound of
the slamming door may come to resonate even more loudly for
us than it did for the audiences of the nineteenth century with
a profound and immediate sense of irony and ambiguity, an
irony and ambiguity which could not have escaped Ibsen
himself.
Thus to take up first the relationship of Nora and Kristine
Linde, a reading of the initial conversation between the two
women reveals a certain narcissistic motivation behind Nora's
response to her old friend. A director staging the scene might
here discover a woman who becomes progressively exhibition-
istic as she displays her own happiness and good fortune in the
7. face of Kristine's misery, a woman who, filled with a sense of
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Carol Strongin Tufts 143
her own importance in managing the loan which saved
Torvalďs
life, makes Kristine into the audience so long denied her, a
kind
of mirror to reflect her own self-admiration back to her. Al-
though she makes use of Kristine as a confidante, she appears
to have little sense of her as a person separate from herself and
no real empathy for her suffering. In fact, her initial treatment
of her suggests a self-absorption which borders on callousness
as she chatters away about her own happiness and good fortune
to this childhood friend who, left with nothing, has come to ask
a job of her husband.
Although it may be argued that her initial conversation
with Kristine is little more than a part of the machinery of the
well-made play, providing the necessary "occasion" that
enables
the playwright to set out his exposition, Ibsen could have
created
8. a Nora who displays genuine empathy and compassion for her
childhood friend. Instead, it is possible to find a character
whose
self-preoccupation leads her, at best, to trivialize and, at worst,
to dismiss the situation and suffering of her friend, as in this
first
conversation between the two women:
MRS. LINDE (in a dispirited and somewhat hesitant voice) .
Hello, Nora.
NORA, (uncertain). Hello -
MRS. LINDE. You don't recognize me.
NORA. No, I don't know - but wait, I think - (Exclaiming.)
What! Kristine! Is it really you?
MRS. LINDE. Yes, it's me.
NORA. Kristine! To think I didn't recognize you. But then,
how could I? (More quietly.) How you've changed, Kristine!
MRS. LINDE. Yes, no doubt I have. In nine - ten long years.
NORA. Is it so long since we met! Yes, it's all of that. Oh,
these last eight years have been a happy time, believe me. And
so
now you've come in to town, too. Made the long trip in the
winter.
That took courage. ... To enjoy yourself over Christmas, of
course. Oh, how lovely! Yes, enjoy ourselves, we'll do that. . . .
(Act I; p. 130)5
And although she goes on to remark that Kristine has grown
paler and thinner since the last time they met, Nora essentially
glosses over the implications of the great change in her friend
to bubble over with her own happiness and to assume that
because she will be enjoying herself this Christmas, Kristine
9. must be in town to do the same.
While there is, on one level, a certain degree of nervousness
here in Nora's initial reaction to Kristine - a desire to hide her
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144 Comparative Drama
shock at Kristine's changed appearance through a kind of
good-natured obtuseness - there may also be, on a deeper level
for an actress playing the part, a wish to avoid the need to
acknowledge the reasons for the change she sees in the other
woman. And what such a wish comes to imply as the conver-
sation continues is her failure to see Kristine as a separate
person, a person whose pain is as real, as legitimate, as her
own
joy. Here is Nora, who has made her entrance this Christmas
Eve "humming happily to herself," carrying "an armload of
packages," possessing money enough to tell the delivery boy
to "keep the change" for the crown which she gives him (Act I;
p. 125). In her own home and about to become financially well-
off as Kristine is not, Nora finds her attractiveness and vitality
10. daily verified by the attentions of her husband and Dr. Rank.
In contrast, Kristine, homeless and dressed in traveling clothes,
is a woman worn out and devoid of all but the most modest of
expectations, her complete exhaustion exemplified by the fact
that she has been passed coming up the stairs by Dr. Rank,
himself dying of congenital degeneration of the spine and so
not the fastest person on his feet (Act I; p. 139).
Kristine, of course, is used by Ibsen as a foil to Nora, who
will become homeless precisely as her old friend acquires a
home. She will find herself alone in the world just as Kristine
ends her own loneliness in marriage to Krogstad. Yet as the
play begins, Nora, caught up in her satisfaction in the prospect
of being able to pay off the loan and in her joy and pride in her
home and family and in Torvald's promotion at the bank, only
acknowledges that Kristine has become a widow after she has
remarked on how happy the last eight years have been for
herself. "Oh, I knew it, of course," Nora admits; "I read it in
the papers. Oh, Kristine, you must believe me; I often thought
of writing you then, but I kept postponing it, and something
always interfered." But Nora's stress here remains on herself.
As Kristine goes on to say that she now has nothing, neither
children nor money, she can respond, "So completely alone.
How terribly hard that must be for you," only immediately to
add, "I have three lovely children. You can't see them now;
they're out with the maid." Consistent with her behavior up to
this point, she plays lip service to Kristine's hardships one
minute only to flaunt her own blessings the next, for Nora,
who adores seeing her children, assumes that her impoverished
and childless friend must adore seeing them too and never
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12. Carol Strongin Tufts 145
supposes that the sight of those children might instead intensify
Kristine's childlessness and desolation. Although she does go
on to insist that Kristine "tell" her "everything," for, Nora says,
"I don't want to be selfish. I want to think only of you today,"
she cannot help adding, "But there is something I must tell you.
Did you hear the wonderful luck we had recently?" (Act I; p.
131). And with this question, Nora has managed again to turn
the subject of the conversation back to herself.
Now Nora can go on to report that Torvald has been made
manager of the bank. Ironically, this is probably the only news
in which Kristine has any real interest, since it is possible that
she has endured Nora's self-congratulatory chatter only because
it is she who is Kristine's entrée to Torvald, the successful man
who might be prevailed upon to help her to find a job. What
is most important here, however, is that Nora seems unable, for
all her stated desire to do so, to focus on Kristine herself. It is
only after Nora has told how "light and happy" she feels, for
it will be "lovely to have stacks of money and not a care in the
world" - this to someone who has been left with nothing, "[n]ot
even a sense of loss to feed on" (Act I; p. 131) - and has
talked about the difficult period of Torvald's illness, that she
pulls herself up short to say, "But how disgusting of me - I'm
talking of nothing but my own affairs" (Act I; p. 133). Yet so
far, Nora has done little else.
For a while after this the conversation turns to Kristine, who
describes her last three years as "one endless workday without
rest." Yet now with her mother dead and her brothers able to
provide for themselves, Kristine can only reply to Nora's "How
free you must feel" with "No - only unspeakably empty.
13. Nothing
to live for now." To try to fill up that emptiness, as well as out
of financial necessity, she has come to town to find a "steady
job, some office work" (Act I; p. 133). But it is as if Nora has
managed not to hear the desperation in her words and, identify-
ing only with the work that she too has had to take on, says,
"Oh, but Kristine, that's so dreadfully tiring, and you already
look so tired. It would be much better for you if you would go
off to a bathing resort." Again, Nora's response, as it suggests
her inability to recognize how Kristine feels, also suggests her
narcissism, for although Nora can understand having had to
work hard - after all, she has had to do that herself - she seems
unable to comprehend the utter desolation which exhausts
Kristine now that her "burdens" have been removed. And it is
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14. 146 Comparative Drama
the callousness implicit in that response which provokes Kris-
tine's bitter reply: "I have no father to give me travel money,
Nora" (Act I; p. 134).
As Kristine finally makes her realize that she has come to
ask Torvald's assistance in finding a job, Nora jumps at the
chance to be her intermediary, not only because she is "so
eager
to help," but also, for a director and an actress responding to
Ibsen's suggestion of her narcissism, because she can use the
opportunity to demonstrate the power she has over Torvald.
"Just leave it to me," she tells Kristine, "I'll bring it up so
delicately - find something attractive to humor him with. Oh,
I'm so eager to help you." To this Kristine replies, in a line
heavy with sarcasm, "How very kind of you, Nora, to be so
concerned over me- doubly kind, considering you really know
so little of life's burdens yourself" (Act I; p. 134).
Kristine's reply, however, is not just an understandable
response to the recital she has had to endure of Nora's
happiness
and good fortune, nor is it simply an indication of her self-
admitted bitterness, for there may also be an implicit sense of
pride here which points to her own narcissism. Beneath the
barely disguised sarcasm of her words is the suggestion of
Kristine's sense of her own importance, her belief that her
problems and her sacrifices have not only been greater than
those of Nora, but that they are, by implication, unique in the
world, that they make her somehow special, superior. If Kris-
tine's line is read with such a suggestion in mind - and if she
herself is considered from what, for an actress playing the part,
could very well be her own view of Nora's treatment of her
throughout the play as little more than a prop, or convenience,
in a relationship without mutual concern or reciprocity - the
15. motivation Ibsen has provided for her actions at the end of the
play takes on a new complexity as she deters Krogstad from
asking for the return of the letter that has been the source of
Nora's agony.
On the surface of it, Torvald must, of course, read that
letter, since that is what brings about the play's denouement,
and Kristine is speaking for Ibsen when she says, "I've seen
such incredible things in this house. Helmer's got to learn
everything; this dreadful secret [Nora's forging of her father's
signature in order to procure the loan] has to be aired; those
two have to come to a full understanding; all these lies and
evasions can't go on" (Act ΠΙ; p. 179). Also, in terms of the
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Carol Strongin Tufts 147
16. play's structure, it is obvious that Nora treats Kristine as little
more than a prop because that is the way Ibsen treats her: it is
Kristine's presence which provides the opportunity for Nora to
express those feelings which she must keep hidden from
Torvald.
Yet beneath the matter of the play's mechanics, it is possible to
see Kristine's own narcissism as a subconscious force which
compels her not only to desire some revenge against the friend
who has always been luckier and more privileged than she -
who has, in fact, ironically turned out to have problems that
surpass her own in their uniqueness - but which also causes her
to feel firm in her conviction that her hardships and suffering
have conferred moral superiority upon her: in her own eyes,
she believes herself absolutely justified in knowing what will
be
best for the Helmers' marriage.
To see narcissism as a subconscious motive for Kristine's
action here is also to see a certain irony in her desire to marry
Krogstad. Another of the gears in the machinery of Ibsen's
well-made play, that marriage, founded as it seems to be on
truth and equality between the partners, is meant to function
as the foil to the marriage of the Helmers, the realistically
attainable possibility which they have failed to achieve. Yet as
she proposes that "we two shipwrecked people . . . reach across
to each other," Kristine tells Krogstad,
I have to go on living. All my born days, as long as I can
remem-
ber, IVe worked, and it's been my best and my only joy. But
now
I'm completely alone in the world; it frightens me to be so
empty
and lost. To work for yourself - there's no joy in that. Nils,
17. give
me something - someone to work for. (Act III; p. 178)
By placing the emphasis here on the urgency of Kristine's own
needs, an actress may find that what she is really asking is that
Krogstad return to her the sense of self that she lost when her
mother died and her brothers became self-sufficient. When
Krogstad, all too aware of his status as social outcast, can only
reply, "And do you really have the courage then?" Kristine's
answer again places her own longing first as she says, "I need
to have someone to care for," adding only after this, "and your
children need a mother. We both need each other" (Act III; p.
178).
With the hint of narcissistic motivation for Kristine's pro-
posal to Krogstad comes the irony that what she is attempting
to reproduce is the one situation that made her feel unique and
important, for she will care and work and sacrifice for the
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148 Comparative Drama
18. morally crippled Krogstad and his children as she had cared
and worked and sacrificed for her invalid mother and younger
brothers. Such a relationship is the only one that she desires,
the only one she can envision, not because she is inherently
selfless, but because it allows her to maintain an idealized
image
of herself. Krogstad may say, "I don't believe all this. It's just
some hysterical feminine urge to go out and make a noble
sacrifice," and Kristine may answer, "Have you ever found me
to be hysterical?" (Act ΙΠ; p. 178), but earlier she has also
told him, "you've never understood me" (Act ΙΠ; p. 176). The
irony here is that such understanding might allow him to know
that her "urge to go out and make a noble sacrifice" is not
motivated by hysteria so much as it may be motivated by the
narcissistic need to recreate the one situation that has made
her feel important and unique and without which she feels
empty, a situation in which he and his children will serve as
props for her own idealized sense of self.
It is that air of self-important uniqueness that lies behind
Kristine's condescending tone in remarking Nora's kindness
toward her - considering, as Kristine sees it, how little of
"life's
burdens" the other woman really knows - and it is her attitude
that prompts Nora to confess the "big thing": that it was she
who raised the money necessary for the trip to Italy that saved
Torvalďs life (Act I; p. 134). When the astonished Kristine
asks her how she could have obtained the money, Nora replies,
"I could have gotten it from some admirer or other. After all,
a girl with my ravishing appeal - " (Act I; p. 136), and later
goes on to speak of her fantasy of a "rich old gentleman who
had fallen in love with me ... [a]nd . . . died, and when his
will was opened, there in big letters it said, 'All my fortune
shall
19. be paid over in cash, immediately, to that enchanting Mrs. Nora
Helmeť" (Act I; pp. 137-38). Told only half in jest, this
fantasy not only foreshadows the scene Nora will play out with
Dr. Rank in Act II, but it also reveals Nora's keen awareness
of the power of her "ravishing appeal."
It is that "appeal" which she knows to be, but will not
acknowledge as the basis of her relationship with Dr. Rank:
the sexually charged subtext of this "friendship" in which Nora
can be seductive and Rank seduced, but only so long as neither
admits that this is what is really happening. Even more import-
ant, however, it is also that "ravishing appeal" which Nora
knows to be at the center of her relationship with Torvald, for
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Carol Strongin Tufts 149
as she goes on to tell Kristine about the loan, she speaks of it
as a secret to be held in reserve for "sometime, years from now,
when I'm no longer so attractive . . . when Torvald loves me
less than now, when he stops enjoying my dancing and dressing
up and reciting for him" (Act I; pp. 136-37). And although
Nora immediately dismisses this possibility as "ridiculous!
That'll
never happen," it is her knowledge that her "beautiful, happy
home" is built on that "appeal," the perfect complement to
Torvald's "masculine pride," that suggests the mutually narcis-
sistic terms of their marriage. Moreover, Nora's seemingly
sudden transformation from the "little lark" of the first two acts
to the determined woman of the third act who is able to slam
the door on her "doll house" and walk out into the world
20. becomes much less sudden if it is seen that the narcissistic
terms
of that marriage cease to be mutual from the moment Torvald
reacts to Krogstad's letter.
As Nora talks to Kristine, admirable as her resourcefulness
in obtaining and repaying the loan may be, her confession
implies a kind of competition over who has endured the most
and worked the hardest and ends as a device to elicit the other
person's astonishment and awe. If Kristine takes pride in her
sacrifices for her mother and brothers, Nora not only proves
that she too has been capable of sacrifice, but that the terms of
that sacrifice have been much more daring. Like Kristine, Nora
views her problems and her deeds as unique; and although it is
true that her obtaining of the loan has indeed been unique
insofar as she is a woman in a society in which women, to look
ahead to the resonant line from Hedda Gabler, "don't do such
things," her act of forgery has been committed by others before
her: Krogstad, after all, is at the bottom of the social ladder
because, as he says, "it was nothing more and nothing worse
that I once did - and it wrecked my whole reputation" (Act I;
p. 149). As for Nora's hardships - her husband's illness, her
scrimping and saving and working at copying at night to repay
the loan - they, too, are not unique, for the mere presence of
Kristine, as well as of Dr. Rank, attests to human suffering as
a commonplace occurrence. And it is Nora's failure to respond
to Kristine's pain with any real degree of empathy that hints
at a narcissism which will also carry over into her relationship
with Dr. Rank. It becomes, therefore, quite in keeping with
Nora's character that she can say as Kristine leaves to see about
finding a room, "What a shame we're so cramped here, but it's
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150 Comparative Drama
quite impossible for us to - " (Act I; p. 142) - sentiments
echoed by Torvald in Act III as he returns late at night from
the masquerade party upstairs and tells Kristine, "I hope you
get home all right. I'd be happy to - but you don't have far to
go" (p. 182). Although Kristine may be useful as an audience
and a mirror to reflect Nora back to herself, the presence of
such a house guest would be an inconvenience which she
prefers
not to have intrude on her holiday. Having listened to, but not
really having taken in Kristine's account of her emotional and
financial impoverishment, she will not put herself out to make
room for her in her "beautiful, happy home."
A director and an actress developing the suggestion of nar-
cissism in Nora's first conversation with Kristine can carry that
suggestion further in Act Π in the scene which takes place
between Nora and Dr. Rank. Here Rank becomes for Nora the
"rich old gentleman" of her fantasy, the way out of Krogstad's
blackmail. The crux of this scene involves Nora's sexual
teasing
of Rank, her hitting him "lightly on the ear" with the flesh-
colored silk stockings she has been dangling before him under
the pretext of displaying part of the costume she will wear to
dance the tarantella on the following night (Act II; p. 164).
The effect of all this is that Rank responds to her request for
"an exceptionally big favor," a "great proof" of his
"friendship,"
with the confession of his love for her, a confession which first
causes her to call for a lamp to be brought in and then to say,
22. "Ah, dear Dr. Rank, that was really mean of you."
In order to see how this scene works in terms of the narcis-
sism that has already been implied by Nora's conversation with
Kristine, it is first necessary to acknowledge Rank's most im-
portant functions in the mechanism of Ibsen's well-made play.
As is obvious, Ibsen has created Rank, this friend of both
husband and wife, as a means of clarifying the play's main
issue
and building the case which must culminate in Nora's departure
from her husband and children. Thus Rank serves to emphasize
Torvald's limitations, his shallowness, and his lack of courage
and compassion, for Rank, who knows that he is dying and that
the process will not be a pretty one, knows too that Torvald
"with his sensitivity" has "a sharp distaste for anything ugly,"
and so tells Nora, "I don't want him near my sickroom. ... I
won't have him there. Under no condition. I'll lock my door to
him" (Act II; p. 163). Also, as the walking emblem of the sins
of the parents being visited upon their children, Rank's dying
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Carol Strongin Tufts 151
of congenital syphilis helps to provide motivation for Nora's
decision to leave her children, since she believes that "The way
I am now, I'm no use to them" (Act ΙΠ; p. 195), an idea
reinforced in her mind by Torvald's earlier pronouncement,
made in reference to Krogstad, that "It's usually the mother's
influence that's dominant" on children who "go bad" (Act I;
p. 152). Moreover, Nora's friendship with Rank also reveals
23. how much of herself her relationship with her husband has cost
her, for as she tells Kristine,
Torvald loves me beyond words, and, as he puts it, he'd like to
keep me all to himself. For a long time he'd almost be jealous
if
I even mentioned any of my old friends back home. So of
course
I dropped that. But with Dr. Rank I talk a lot about such things,
because he likes hearing about them. (Act II; p. 157)
It is, therefore, no wonder that Nora can so ironically say in
describing to Rank the difference in her feelings for Torvald
and for him, "you see, there are some people that one loves
most and other people that one would almost prefer being with"
(Act II; p. 166).
Yet the underlying narcissism which has caused Nora to be
so tactlessly obtuse in her conversation with Kristine can now
be
seen as leading her into unconscious cruelty in her
manipulation
of Rank whom she tantalizes with her silk stockings in a des-
perate attempt to make fantasy into reality and to transform
him
into the dreamed-of "rich old gentleman" so taken with her
"ravishing appeal" that he becomes her financial savior. In so
doing, not only does she exploit his feelings with no regard for
his personal integrity - the cost to him of confessing his love
and the importance he places on that confession as he tells her,
"I swore to myself you should know this before I'm gone" (Act
Π; p. 165) - but she also fails to appreciate the literal reality
which has prompted him to speak at all: his knowledge that
"Within a month I'll probably be laid out and rotting in the
churchyard. . . . But the worst of it is all the other horror
before
24. it's over" (Act II; p. 162). What angers and appalls Nora is
not that Rank loves her, but that in telling her of that love he
has done exactly the one thing which she has not wanted him
to do, for, as she says, "you came out and told me. That was
quite unnecessary. . . . Why did you have to be so clumsy,
Dr. Rank! Everything was so good" (Act II; pp. 165-66). For
the actress playing Nora, the "everything" that was "so good"
may be felt as a narcissistic sense of entitlement with its
freedom
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152 Comparative Drama
to allow her to bask in Rank's attention and admiration, even
to ask "an exceptionally big favor" of him, without ever having
to acknowledge her responsibility in eliciting the feelings
which
she knows, even before he says it, place his "body and soul" at
her "command." And thus the final cruelty here becomes her
failure to consider how that "everything" must have felt to
Rank
himself, how what was "so good" for her was, ironically, so
bittersweet for him.
To see Nora's behavior in this scene with Rank as being
consistent with the narcissism that has already been implied as
motivation for many of her words and actions up to this point
is to go beyond the need for the usual kind of justification for
that behavior such as that offered, for example, by a critic like
F. L. Lucas who begins with the assumption that "grief is
egotistic" so that he may go on to insist:
25. Nora, under the shadow of her own disaster, cannot really
believe
in his. Here, indeed, she may seem a little too obtuse. She is
not
callously selfish. . . ; she is simply, in her worried distraction,
insensitive and blind. And so, self-centred like a child on her
own
perplexities, but hoping for help from her old friend, she now
slips
into innocent coquetries, which kindle this lonely man on the
edge
of the grave to a guarded declaration of passion. 6
Yet even Lucas must admit that "it is Nora" who, "in this
instant, grows ťugly'"7 And though he may rationalize that
ugliness by seeing Nora as the victim of a "father-fixation"
which causes her to view Rank as a father substitute, "a kind of
sugar-daddy" whom she can play with and tease but to whom
"she cannot give ... the sympathetic compassion of a mature
woman, only the petulance of a priggish child,"8 this incident
of the silk stockings is indeed so jarring to the totally sympa-
thetic romantic view of Nora that its distastefulness may have
led Eva Le Gallienne to cut it from her translation of the play.9
Complete sympathy for Nora, however, may require cutting
all those "ugly" words and actions which Ibsen himself gave
her
and accepting without criticism the romanticism which she at
once embraces and embodies. While it may indeed be true, as
Elaine Hoffman Baruch has stated, that Nora "ultimately rejects
a romanticism that rests on illusion and fantasy [as] she accepts
a more profound romantic value in her assertion of the primacy
of the individual over all other claims,"10 it is precisely this
"assertion of the primacy of the individual over all other
claims"
26. which, as Ibsen has drawn it here, may be seen as causing this
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Carol Strongin Tufts 153
character to become as much a victimizer as she is a victim, as
much the exploiter of others as she has been exploited by them.
What is important, as Patricia Meyer Spacks has pointed out,
is to recognize that while "Nora is self-dramatizing too, . . .
Ibsen never allows us to accept her at her own valuation. Much
of the tension, the vitality, the complexity of Ibsen's play
derives
from this fact." H Moreover, Nora is not the only character
engaged in self-dramatization, driven by a need to see an ideal-
ized image of herself reflected back to her in the eyes of
others.
This, after all, is what Kristine has also attempted and, though
in one aspect she has failed as the tremendous energy of Nora's
need has come to dominate her own, she does finally succeed
when Krogstad allows her, in essence, to make her "noble
sacrifice" for him and his children. It is this same kind of self-
dramatization which also provides much of the motivation for
Rank's behavior, not only in his speeches to Nora about his
imminent death, but in the staging of his final farewell to the
Helmers, complete with the condemned man's request for a last
cigar as he leaves to deposit in their mailbox the calling card
marked with "a black cross over the name . . . announcing his
own death" (Act III; p. 186).
Thus, as Inga-Stina Ewbank has noted, "For most of this
27. play, the dialogue brings out what the action implies: that the
central characters are all playing parts before each other," so
that "the fancy dress ball on the floor above, for which there
is no plot-necessity, . . . functions as a telling image of human
relationships."^ And the irony of Rank's final farewell here is
that his carefully staged exit has no more than a momentary
effect on the Helmers who, as Ewbank has also noted, are
themselves involved in the play's "central game, or part,
playing
[which] is, of course," their "whole marital relationship."13
Caught up in the scenario of her planned self-sacrifice as she
waits for Torvald to read Krogstad's letter and so bring about
the "miracle" of which she has been dreaming, Nora can only
react to the announcement of Rank's imminent death by trans-
forming it into her own as she tells Torvald, "If it has to
happen, then it's best it happens in silence" (Act III; p. 186).
And Rank ceases to exist for her except as the excuse to put
Torvald off sexually so that he may at last read his mail. It is
Torvald's own narcissistic reaction to Rank's black-marked
calling cards which foreshadows his equally narcissistic
reaction
to Krogstad's letter. Sounding very much like the histrionic
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154 Comparative Draina
Hjalmar Ekdal of Ibsen's later play The Wild Duck, Torvalďs
initial response implies more about the dramatizing self-con-
sciousness of the speaker than it does about any real feeling he
might have for the plight of the individual who has occasioned
28. the speech: "Ah, my poor friend!" says Torvald, "Of course I
knew he wouldn't be here much longer. But so soon - And
then to hide himself away like a wounded animal." For Torvald
soon reveals his true feelings as he continues:
He'd grown right into our lives. I simply can't imagine him
gone.
He with his suffering and loneliness - like a dark cloud setting
off
our sunlit happiness. Well, maybe it's best this way. For him, at
least. . . . And maybe for us too, Nora. Now we're thrown back
on each other, completely. (Embracing her.) Oh you, my
darling
wife, how can I hold you close enough? (Act III; p. 186)
Torvald, in effect, immediately proceeds to answer his own
question by revealing his cherished romantic fantasy of himself
as gallant knight and his wife as damsel in distress: "You know
what, Nora - time and again I've wished you were in some
terrible danger, just so I could stake my life and soul and
everything for your sake" (Act III; p. 186). But Torvald's
fantasy has also been Nora's own, the "miracle" for which she
waits. This shared fantasy, which comes to fail them both, can
be seen as the central game of their marriage, the very founda-
tion of the mutual narcissism which has bound them together.
And as he reads Krogstad's letter, it is that foundation itself
which begins to crumble.
For Torvald, it was Nora's "ravishing appeal" - her "scam-
pering] about and dofing] tricks" (Act II; p. 159), but most
of all her "innocence" and "helplessness" - which fed his
grand-
iose sense of self-importance, providing him with the constant
attention and admiration his narcissism required. Yet because
Torvald over-idealized Nora as he over-idealized their marriage
itself, the news that his "little lark" has not only not been
29. innocent, but that she has in fact also been capable of action
in the world outside the "doll house," can, for an actor playing
the part, provide motivation for the instant shift Torvald makes
from over-idealization to utter devaluation:
Oh, what an awful awakening! In all these eight years - she
who
was my pride and joy - a hypocrite, a liar - worse, worse - a
crim-
inal! How infinitely disgusting it all is! The shame! . . .
Oh, to have to say this to someone I've loved so much! Well,
that's
done with. (Act III; pp. 187, 188)
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Carol Strongin Tufts 155
And it is in that "awful awakening" too that the actor playing
Torvald in a contemporary production of the play can come
to realize an even deadlier threat that this character feels to his
vision of himself, a threat which, like Nora's own action,
resides
in the world outside the "doll house," for in dealing with Krog-
stad, she has placed her husband in the power of the one
person who refuses to validate his sense of self-importance.
Looking at him, Krogstad does not see the powerful man of
affairs, the soon-to-be manager of the bank, but his old teenage
"crony" still to be addressed on a "first-name basis ... in front
of" all those "others" who possess the ultimate power to
confirm
30. or destroy Torvald's image of himself in the greater world out-
side the "doll house." Thus it is no wonder that all that now
concerns the panic-stricken Torvald is "saving the bits and
pieces, the appearance," since it is "the appearance" which has
always been for him "all that matters" (Act ΙΠ; p. 188).
Yet as Krogstaďs second letter arrives and that "appearance"
is no longer under threat, though Torvald may shout, "I'm
saved. Nora, I'm saved!" (Act III; p. 188), the irony is that he
has already destroyed the mutual terms of the narcissism which
has bound him together with his wife. It is important, therefore,
to reconsider the reason for Nora's act in finally leaving
Torvald,
since that reason may not be nearly so transparent as the asser-
tion of selfhood which most productions of the play have made
it - nor as relatively straightforward as a critic such as Baruch,
for example, has described it: that is, because he has failed "to
live up to her image of him." 14 In fact, that reason finally be-
comes even more subtle than Torvald's simply laying bare a
narcissistic self-concern in which there has been no care for his
wife. For Ibsen has provided a much more ironic complexity of
motivation for Nora's final action if Torvald, in his own self-
concern, is viewed as having essentially denied her the ultimate
act that could have completed and made perfect her own ideal-
ized vision of herself. Nora may indeed have been awaiting
the "miracle" in which her husband was supposed to "step
forward, take the blame on" himself "and say: I am the guilty
one" (Act III; p. 194); but the real essence of that "miracle"
would have been her own response, since as she tells her
husband:
You're thinking I'd never accept such a sacrifice from you? No,
of
course not. But what good would my protests be against you?
31. That
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156 Comparative Drama
was the miracle I was waiting for, in terror and hope. And to
stave
that off, I would have taken my life. (Act III; p. 194)
As Arthur Ganz has pointed out, "Torvald has been, in one
of Ibsen's ultimate ironies, almost as much Nora's 'doll' (the
puppet-hero of her dreams) as she has been his. . . ."15 And
the greatest irony of all may be that what that "puppet-hero"
has
denied her has not been his own sacrifice for her sake, but
rather the opportunity to prevent his sacrifice with a more
daring
one of her own. What was to be accomplished by such a
sacrifice
is not necessarily, as Ganz has seen it, "the abnegation of the
self that she had assented to in her doll's house," 16 but rather
the narcissistic affirmation of an idealized self which will
never
have to face the time when, as Nora has feared from the
beginning, "Torvald loves me less than now, when he stops
enjoying my dancing and dressing up and reciting for him"
(Act I; p. 137). In sacrificing herself to save her husband, Nora
could have remained forever the perfect object of his love.
Thus to follow Ibsen's suggestion of Nora's narcissism
32. throughout the play also makes it possible to see a more subtle
irony in Torvald's failure to perform the "miracle" in which
she has placed all her hope. For she has been enthralled by a
dream of self-sacrifice from the moment Kristine tells her tale
of suffering in the service of others, and it is that dream which
her husband betrays. Robbed of it and of the idealized self-
image that has been at its center, she can only respond to him
with the rage which, despite its muted quality, is the mirror
image of his own response to Krogstad's letter. Because she has
over-idealized Torvald as he has over-idealized her, Nora, as
her husband has done before her, utterly devaluates the eight
years of their marriage. But though she tells him, "You don't
understand me. And I've never understood you either - until
tonight" (Act III; p. 190), the irony is that they have under-
stood each other all too well until tonight when narcissistic
need
of each to maintain an idealized self-image has come to
exclude
the identical need of the other.
Stripped of the narcissistic dream of self-sacrifice, Nora now
speaks of fulfilling her "Duties to herself"; as she tells Torvald,
"I believe that, before all else, I'm a human being, no less than
you - or anyway, I ought to try to become one." Yet although
our sympathies as an audience are with her as she appears to
recognize the hollowness of her former ideal and as she cour-
ageously prepares to leave her home so that she may try to
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Carol Strongin Tufts 157
33. "stand completely alone ... to discover myself and the world
out there" (Act ΠΙ; p. 192) - which is to say, to discover an
authentic self - Ibsen has imbued Nora's exit from her "doll
house" with irony and a certain ambiguity. And that irony and
ambiguity are rooted in Nora's own lack of any real substance
on which to base her quest as well as in the possibility that the
world outside the "doll house" is much the same as the world
within its walls.
The fact is, as Spacks has pointed out, that although Nora
"now testifies to the need for facing reality ... she is still
supported by an image of herself as heroine, a dream of
romantic
defiance of society in all its power," 17 as she determines to
discover "who's right, the world or I" (Act III; p. 193). And
it is because Nora has replaced one idealized self-image with
another that she may find herself with nothing on which to
build an authentic self in a world that, as Ibsen portrays it, is
filled with individuals engaged in a masquerade in which there
may be nothing beneath the mask. If Nora is seen as remaining
as much the narcissist as she has always been, the troublesome
issue of the relative ease with which she appears to leave her
children can at last be resolved, for her first concern has
always
been herself. The real irony here, then, is that the woman who
only moments ago was so completely prepared to sacrifice her
own life for the sake of her husband ends by calling upon her
"duties to herself" and leaves her children, as Marvin
Rosenberg
has stated, "in the hands" of that same husband whom she
"knows to be so corrupt [that] she will not even trust herself
with him."18
Equipped now with the baggage of a new narcissistic self-
34. image, Nora closes the door on the "doll house" which has been
her home with Torvald to find herself facing another door
which
opens into the larger "doll house," the world in which she and
all the characters live and move. Taking Ibsen at his "insistence
that his individual works should be regarded as parts of a
thematic whole, modern Ibsen commentators," as Roslyn Belkin
has written, "have discerned that, in varying ways, Ibsen's
entire
canon continues the nineteenth century Romantic tradition
which argues for the supremacy of the individual over any kind
of repressive social convention." 19 Yet looking at the
influences
exercised by that Romantic tradition, we at the end of the
twentieth century, even more than Ibsen's contemporaries, have
come to know its excesses which, as in the case of the cult of
the
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158 Comparative Drama
"supremacy of the individual," too often become, like Nora's
tarantella, a wild dance to be performed before enraptured
spectators who will reflect the performance back to the dancer.
And so it is in recasting A Doll House for a contemporary
production that we may discover that Ibsen, the social critic,
saw two sides to the Romantic celebration of the supremacy of
the individual. Also Ibsen, the poet whose task was the "des-
cription of humanity," wrote more prophetically than even he
may have known, for his Nora finally did not so much slam the
door on the past as the playwright himself, going far beyond
35. the issue of women's rights, opened the door connecting that
past with the future.
NOTES
ι Speech delivered at the Banquet of the Norwegian League for
Women's Rights,
Christiania, 26 May 1898, in Ibsen: Letters and Speeches, ed.
Evert Sprinchorn (New
York: Hill and Wang, 1964), p. 337.
2 Rolf Fjelde, Introduction to A Doll House, in Henrik Ibsen,
The Complete
Major Prose Plays (New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 1978), p.
121.
3 For studies of the prevalence of the narcissistic personality
disorder in con-
temporary psychoanalytic literature, see Otto F. Kernberg,
Borderline Conditions and
Pathological Narcissism (New York: J. Aronson, 1975); Heinz
Kohut, The Analysis
of the Self (New York: International Universities Press, 1971);
and Peter L. Giova-
chinni, Psychoanalysis of Character Disorders (New York: J.
Aronson, 1975). See
also Christopher Lasch, The Culture of Narcissism (New York:
Norton, 1979), for
a discussion of narcissism as the defining characteristic of
contemporary American
society.
4 Task Force on Nomenclature and Statistics, American
Psychiatric Association,
DSM-UI: Diagnostic Criteria Draft (New York, 1978), pp. 103-
04.
36. 5 Henrik Ibsen, A Doll House, in Ibsen, The Complete Major
Prose Plays, trans.
Fjelde; all citations to this play in my text refer to this
translation.
6 F. L. Lucas, The Drama of Ibsen and Strindberg (New York:
Macmillan,
1962), p. 141.
7 Ibid., p. 142.
8 Ibid., p. 142.
9 Henrik Ibsen, Six Plays, trans. Eva Le Gallienne (New York:
Random House,
1957).
io Elaine Hoffman Baruch, "Ibsen's Doll House: A Myth for
Our Time," Yale
Review, 69 (1980), 384.
il Patricia Meyer Spacks, "Confrontation and Escape in Two
Social Dramas,"
Modern Drama, 11 (1968), 71.
12 Inga-Stina Ewbank, "Ibsen's Dramatic Language As a link
Between His 'Real-
ism' and His 'Symbolism'," Contemporary Approaches to Ibsen,
Proceedings of the
First International Ibsen Seminary (Oslo: Universitetsforlaget,
1966), p. 120.
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37. Carol Strongin Tufts 159
13 Ibid., p. 120.
14 Barach, "Ibsen's Doll House," p. 378.
15 Arthur Ganz, "Miracle and Vine Leaves: An Ibsen Play
Rewrought," PMLA,
94 (1979), 14.
16 Ibid., p. 19.
1 7 Spacks, "Confrontation and Escape," p. 66.
18 Marvin Rosenberg, "Ibsen vs. Ibsen or: Two Versions of A
Doll's House"
Modem Drama, 12 (1969), 195.
19 Roslyn Belkin, "Prisoners of Convention: Ibsen's Other'
Women," Journal of
Women's Studies in Literature, 1, No. 2 (Spring 1979), 142.
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Contentsp. 140p. 141p. 142p. 143p. 144p. 145p. 146p. 147p.
148p. 149p. 150p. 151p. 152p. 153p. 154p. 155p. 156p. 157p.
158p. 159Issue Table of ContentsComparative Drama, Vol. 20,
No. 2 (Summer 1986) pp. 95-190Front MatterGeneric
Complexity in Ibsen's "An Enemy of the People" [pp. 95-
114]Profane Icon: The Throne Scene of Shakespeare's "Richard
III" [pp. 115-123]The Evolution of Shakespearean Metadrama:
Abel, Burckhardt, and Calderwood [pp. 124-139]Recasting "A
41. 9
A
B
C
D
Year
GDP per capita ($)
CO2 per capita
1870
1875.65065
358.818939
1871
1899.40749
363.573719
1872
2078.42666
441.306829
1873
1922.09613
474.357959
1874
2157.23247
449.400694
1875
2219.06918
466.000366
1876
2028.21946
464.555446
1877
2127.48217
452.276027
Feuil1GivennameFamilynameCountryAgeHeightThomasOliverE
ngland2062WilliamBarberIreland2069GeorgeMartinIreland2065
RichardWelshIreland2068JamesBlackScotland2066WilliamLeith
44. Ireland
20
James
Black
Scotland
20
William
Leith
Scotland
20
John
Berness
Italy
20
Samuel
Taylor
England
20
Feuil1DistrictSub-DistrictGrain wage (minots per day)Length of
growing season DISTANCE FROM CLOSEST URBAN
CENTREDeath ratesST-HYACINTHESt-
Hyacinthe0.182165328.6975717439NICOLETBécancour0.20201
.439452216.343595591BELLECHASSEBeaumong0.20190.3489
2524.0615976901ST-MAURICEPointe du
Lac0.21198.08232052.091554854L'ISLETL'Islet0.21187.566718
134.3866171004VERCHÈRESVerchères0.21211.849763220.119
2250373ST-HYACINTHESt-
Damase0.21212.004721.2539851222VERCHÈRESBeloiel0.2122
03223.2426303855VERCHÈRESSt-
Antoine0.212154323.3160621762BEAUCESte-
Claire0.21187.20494428.6738351254VERCHÈRESContrecoeur0
.21209.403824632.7749453751VERCHÈRESSt-
Marc0.212123440.2788536019BELLECHASSESaint-
Gervais0.21187.097793650.3084954912L'ASSOMPTIONSaint-
Jacques0.21202.397554522.358974359L'ISLETCap St-
50. Question 1:
Assume that a relationship is linear between two variables:
gender inequality and economic freedom. Gender inequality is a
continuous measure of differences in socioeconomic outcomes
(e.g. wages, incomes, education, health) that is presented in an
index form (between 0 and 1 where 0 is no inequality and 1 is
high inequality). Economic freedom is a continuous measure of
the liberties of individuals to engage in economic activity. It
accounts for the size of government, the enforcement of
property rights and the rule of law, business regulations and
trade openness (i.e. barriers to international trade like tariffs
and quotas). The economic freedom measure goes from 0 to 10
where higher values denote more freedom.
Imagine now that there is this economist who comes around and
tells you that more economic freedom would increase equality
of outcomes between men and women. He tells you that he
predicts that each additional point of economic freedom would
reduce the gender inequality by 0.15. He writes the following
equation for predicting gender inequality:
Where EFW is the economic freedom of the world value for
country i and EGI is the estimated gender inequality index value
for country i. Given that he used the data in the table below, has
he estimated the effect of EFW on EGI correctly? I want to see
all the elements (not the calculations per se, just the different
concepts that you needed) that you need to answer this so that I
know you didn’t just go in excel or stata to do it (only half the
points are given for the right answer).
EFW
EGI
52. Singapore
8.71
0.067
Papua New Guinea
6.36
0.741
Serbia
6.89
0.181
Venezuela
2.58
0.454
Question 2:
Boston and Quebec City were two important colonial cities
during the eighteenth century. One was the capital of the
Massachusetts colony and the other was the administrative
capital of the French empire in North America until 1759 (the
city was conquered in 1759 and the colony formally capitulated
to the British in 1760). However, economists and economic
historians have pointed out that war-related shocks affected the
Quebec economy more than the Boston economy. The reason
they postulate for this is that the population of the rest of the
colony was relatively small compared to that of Massachusetts.
When wars occurred, warfare at sea meant that both cities
would be isolated from the rest of the world because ships could
not get to ports. However, Boston had a much larger internal
market (because of Massachusetts’ relatively large population)
than Quebec did. Because of that, prices were more volatile in
Quebec than in Boston. If we wanted to know whether or not it
is true that prices were more volatile in Quebec than in Boston,
what measure would we use and why (half the points)?
Calculate that measure given the price indexes reported below
(half the points)
53. Table 2: Price Index for Quebec and Massachusetts, 1720-1735
(where base is 1840-1845 = 1)
Massachusetts
Quebec
1720
0.787
0.929
1721
0.740
0.803
1722
0.779
0.784
1723
0.789
0.781
1724
0.832
0.787
1725
0.985
0.802
1726
0.953
0.736
1727
0.895
0.611
1728
0.838
0.584
1729
0.829
0.629
1730
54. 0.832
0.739
1731
0.741
0.699
1732
0.694
0.773
1733
0.689
0.732
1734
0.694
0.748
1735
0.711
0.660
Question 3:
In the file “Prison 1820.xlsx” on OWL, you will find a
population of non-Canadian adult prisoners accepted to the
Quebec City prison and who were born in 1820 (but not
necessarily admitted at the same time). The dataset provides
information about their heights in inches. Take prisoner number
93 and tell me what you can from him relative to the population
he is from. What is the best single measure that would inform us
about how he differs from that population (half the points)?
55. With that measure, can you tell me how he “stands” (pun
intended) relative to the whole population (half the points)?
56. Question 4:
In the file “GDP CO2 France.xlsx”, you will observe that there
are three series. The first is the year between 1870 and 2010.
The second is the GDP per capita of France for each of those
years (adjusted for inflation). The third is the amount of CO2
emitted per person in France in each of those years. Using the
dataset (you are free to use excel or Stata), how does GDP per
capita predict CO2 emissions per capita in each year? Fill in the
equation below (half the points).
If you explore the dataset, do you think this equation is an
appropriate way to predict CO2? Provide an explanation for
your answer (half the points).
57. Question 5:
Say that there is a herd of cows at a stampede (probably the one
in Calgary). People must guess the exact number of cows and
the mean weight of the herd. There is a challenge whereby you
can win 1,000$ if you guess the number of cows and the weight
right. If more than one person gets it right, the prize is shared
equally. A large number of people participate in the challenge.
If I share with you the idiom that there is a certain “wisdom of
crowds”, how would that idiom speak to guessing the true size
and mean weight of the herd? Please provide an explanation in
less than 100 words.
58. Question 6:
Lower Canada (as Quebec was known) in 1831 was a largely
agricultural society. Most individuals lived in the countryside
(more than 80%). Only a small share of the population lived in
cities or small towns. While it was gradually urbanizing, people
tended to be reluctant to move the cities. A part of this
59. reluctance stemmed from the fact that cities were known to be
problematic in terms of health. Foreign ships would often carry
diseases from abroad such as smallpox. Deficient water
infrastructures made yellow fever more likely. Both diseases
being contagious, the high density of population in the cities
meant that they could spread faster. True, wages were higher in
the cities, but this health risk was an important deterrent to
moving to the cities.
In that year, the colonial government made a census that
collected information about wages across the colony. Not all
districts returned their schedules, but a large enough number of
them did. The census can be combined with parish registers that
compile the number of burials in the same year. It can also be
combined with geographic information such as distance of each
parish from the closest large cities and the quality of land in the
area.
In the file titled “Death Rates 1831.xlsx” in OWL, you will find
this information compiled as follows: death rates (per 1,000),
wage rates (expressed in terms of how many bushel of wheat
you could buy with one day’s wage), distance from the closest
urban center (in KM) and the length of the growing season (in
days).
You can use excel or Stata for this exercise. Please report how
well each variable explains death rates (half the points). If you
had to pick only one variable to predict death rates, which one
would it be (explain why given the information given in the first
paragraph) (half the points)?
60. Question 7:
In 1831, Lower Canada (modern day Quebec) was a largely
French-speaking Catholic colony. The Catholic church is known
to be a very well-run organization with a centralized structure.
This stands in contrast with protestant churches that are more
decentralized. This governance structure is of relevance because
the virtual totality burials and births were conducted by
religious organizations. However, the Catholic parishes would
keep well-detailed registered that compiled burials and deaths
and sent back reports to their archbishop. The archbishop
would, in turn, share this information with the colonial
legislature which would report the number of deaths and births
per parish on a roughly annual basis in a publication called the
Appendix to the Journals of the House of Assembly of Lower
Canada. However, the Protestant churches (which represented
roughly 20% of the colony’s population) rarely provided this
information to the legislature and when they did, it was
incomplete and cannot be compared with the Catholic districts.
Thus, we have a large sample of parishes in the colony but it is
still a sample.
In the file titled “Death Rates 1831.xlsx” in OWL, you will find
61. this information compiled as follows: death rates (per 1,000),
wage rates (expressed in terms of how many bushel of wheat
you could buy with one day’s wage), distance from the closest
urban center (in KM) and the length of the growing season (in
days). Consider only the “Death Rates” variable (the others are
related to question 6) in order to answer the following
questions:
How would you go about measuring how well the mean death
rate of the sample of Catholic parishes speaks to the mean of
death rates for the whole colony? (Half the points, you must
provide numbers, not just a verbal explanation)
What could make you doubt this answer? Provide an
explanation (in less than 150 words) of what could make
reluctant to say something about the colony using only the
Catholic parishes (there are several possible answers that I can
accept?). (Half the points).
Question 8:
62. We are interested in the idea of whether or not there are gains to
productivity from larger farms. In the table below, you will see
that we provide output per acre on the different farms of Quebec
in 1861 and the average size of farms in that same year.
Given that information, can you find out how the average size
of a farm best predicts output per acre (half the points)? How
would you interpret that answer in light of economic theory
claiming that there is a link between scale (i.e. average farm
size) and productivity (output per acre) (half the points)?
Statistic
Average Size of Farm (in Acres)
Output Per Acre ($)
Mean
40.96795
9.714949
Variance
1288.224
Standard Deviation
8.290091
Min
.8
0
Max
627.8142
110.6153
Median
35.56877
7.919821
Covariance between variables
-57.6544945
![Recasting "A Doll House": Narcissism As Character Motivation
in Ibsen's Play
Author(s): Carol Strongin Tufts
Source: Comparative Drama, Vol. 20, No. 2 (Summer 1986), pp.
140-159
Published by: Comparative Drama
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/41153229
Accessed: 15-10-2018 19:22 UTC
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