8/18/2019 A Doll House Alterrnate Ending

1/1

 

"THE ALTERNATIVE 'GERMAN' ENDING 

Under strong pressure, and very reluctantly, Ibsen wrote an alternative ending for the German

theatre. Both Maurice in Hamburg and Laube in Vienna pressed for a 'conciliatory' ending, asalso did Frau Hedwig Niemann-Raabe who was to play Nora on tour. Copyright laws in Norway

did not extend to Germany, so the German producers could have changed it themselves if theywanted to. In the end, Ibsen himself provided the following additional dialogue. In order to avoid

a ‘barbarous outrage” he wrote it himself, saying if the play was going to have violence done to

it, he would prefer to be the one to do it. The play was a (controversial) success in Germany, butIbsen later regretted having written the alternative ending.

 NORA. . . . Where we could make a real marriage out of our lives together. Goodbye. [ Begins to go.]

HELMER. Go then! [Seizes her arm.] But first you shall see your children for the last time!

 NORA. Let me go! I will not see them! I cannot!

HELMER. [draws her over to the door, left]. You shall see them. [Opens the door and says

 softly.] Look, there they are asleep, peaceful, and carefree. Tomorrow when they wake up andcall for their mother, they will be--motherless.

 NORA. [trembling ]. Motherless . . . !

HELMER. As you once were.

 NORA. Motherless! [Struggles with herself, lets her travelling bag fall, and says.] Oh, this is asin against myself, but I cannot leave them. [ Half sinks down the door .]

HELMER [ joyfully, but softly]. Nora!

[The curtain falls.]" (287-88) 

From The Oxford Ibsen. Trans. James Walter McFarlane. Vol. 4. New York and Toronto: Oxford

UP, 1961.