A Doll's House and Other Plays

The League of Youth (1869) was Ibsen's first venture into realistic social drama and marks a turning-point in his style. By 1879, Ibsen was convinced that women suffer an inevitable violation of their personalities within the context of marriage. In A Doll's House, he portrayed the wife struggling to break free: this was unheard of at the time and Ibsen's play caused a sensation. Continuing the theme of tensions within the family in The Lady from the Sea, Ibsen put forward the view that freedom with responsibility might at least be a step in the right direction.