Written by Henrik Ibsen

Publisher: Det Kongelige Teater
Pages: 72
Genre: Plays, Classics
Published: 1879-12-21
Original Language: Norwegian

A Doll's House, written two years after The Pillars of Society, was the first of Ibsen's plays to create a sensation and is now perhaps his most famous play, and required reading in many secondary schools and universities. The play was highly controversial when first published, as it is sharply critical of 19th Century marriage norms. It follows the formula of well-made play up until the final act, when it breaks convention by ending with a discussion, not an unravelling. It is often called the first true feminist play, although Ibsen denied this.

Read in Norwegian
Rating: 3/5
Review: A dolls house is a tough one for me. I know that I read it in Norwegian before I started rating books, so this rating would reflect what I thought about it when I read it in English a few years later. However, I recall never having liked it much in written form.

That said, I’ve seen at least three productions of it on stage, and I’ve always liked the staged versions a lot, so I undoubtedly think it’s a good play, and a great story. It might just be one of those plays that for me works much better as an actual play than it does in written form.