The play concerns the fate of a married woman, who, at the time in Norway, lacked reasonable opportunities for self-fulfillment in a male-dominated world.

Despite the fact that Ibsen denied it was his intent to write a feminist play, it was a great sensation at the time[2] and caused a "storm of outraged controversy" that went beyond the theater to the world of newspapers and society.

[4] UNESCO has inscribed Ibsen's autographed manuscripts of A Doll's House on the Memory of the World Register in 2001, in recognition of their historical value.

"[7] Notable productions Tasha Lawrence The play opens around Christmas time as Nora Helmer enters her home carrying many packages and presents.

She told Torvald that her father gave her the money, but, in fact, she illegally borrowed it without his knowledge (women were forbidden from conducting financial activities such as signing checks without a man's endorsement).

Torvald refuses to hear her pleas, explaining that Krogstad is a liar and a hypocrite and that, years before, he had committed a crime: he forged other people's signatures.

Krogstad informs Nora that he has written a letter detailing her crime (forging her father's signature of surety on the bond) and put it in Torvald's mailbox, which is locked.

Torvald enters and tries to retrieve his mail, but Nora distracts him by begging him to help her with the dance she has been rehearsing for the costume party, feigning anxiety about performing.

Kristine tells Krogstad that she only married her husband because she had no other means to support her sick mother and young siblings and that she has returned to offer him her love again.

He preserves his peace of mind by thinking of the incident as a mere mistake that she made owing to her foolishness, one of her most endearing feminine traits.

Therefore, for it to be considered acceptable, and prevent the translator from altering his work, Ibsen was forced to write an alternative ending for the German premiere.

Similar to the events in the play, Laura signed an illegal loan to save her husband's life—in this case, to find a cure for his tuberculosis.

The fate of this friend of the family shook him deeply, perhaps also because Laura had asked him to intervene at a crucial point in the scandal, which he did not feel able or willing to do.

Kieler eventually rebounded from the shame of the scandal and had her own successful writing career while remaining discontented with sole recognition as "Ibsen's Nora" years afterward.

[11][12] Ibsen started thinking about the play around May 1878, although he did not begin its first draft until a year later, having reflected on the themes and characters in the intervening period (he visualized its protagonist, Nora, for instance, as having approached him one day wearing "a blue woolen dress").

[17] A Doll's House received its world premiere on 21 December 1879 at the Royal Danish Theatre in Copenhagen, with Betty Hennings as Nora, Emil Poulsen as Torvald, and Peter Jerndorff as Dr.

[18] Writing for the Norwegian newspaper Folkets Avis, the critic Erik Bøgh admired Ibsen's originality and technical mastery: "Not a single declamatory phrase, no high dramatics, no drop of blood, not even a tear.

"[20] Since the playwright's wishes were not protected by copyright, Ibsen decided to avoid the danger of being rewritten by a lesser dramatist by committing what he called a "barbaric outrage" on his play himself and giving it an alternative ending in which Nora did not leave.

[24] This version was also played in Hamburg, Dresden, Hanover, and Berlin, although, in the wake of protests and a lack of success, Raabe eventually restored the original ending.

Writing in 1896 in his book The Foundations of a National Drama, Jones says: "A rough translation from the German version of A Doll's House was put into my hands, and I was told that if it could be turned into a sympathetic play, a ready opening would be found for it on the London boards.

[...] Toward the middle of the action Ibsen was thrown to the fishes, and Nora was saved from suicide, rebellion, flight and immorality by making a faithful old clerk steal her fateful promissory note from Krogstad's desk.

In 1886, the first production in England took place at Eleanor Marx's lodgings in London and featured her as Nora and her friend George Bernard Shaw in the role of Krogstad; both were champions of Ibsen.

[8] The first public British production of the play in its regular form opened on 7 June 1889 at the Novelty Theatre, starring Janet Achurch as Nora and Charles Charrington as Torvald.

A new translation by Zinnie Harris at the Donmar Warehouse, starring Gillian Anderson, Toby Stephens, Anton Lesser, Tara FitzGerald and Christopher Eccleston opened in May 2009.

[34] In August 2013, Young Vic[35] produced a new adaptation[36] of A Doll's House directed by Carrie Cracknell[37] based on the English language version by Simon Stephens.

[38] In June 2015, Space Arts Centre in London staged an adaptation of A Doll's House featuring the discarded alternate ending.

[40] Though the plot largely remained unchanged, the protagonists were renamed Tom and Niru Helmer and a conversation was added regarding the British oppression of the Indian public.

[41] A production of A Doll's House by The Jamie Lloyd Company starring Jessica Chastain was scheduled to play at the Playhouse Theatre in London in mid-2020.

[45] The Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, however, found Ibsen's willingness to examine society without prejudice exhilarating.

George Bernard Shaw suggests that she left to begin "a journey in search of self-respect and apprenticeship to life" and that her revolt is "the end of a chapter of human history".