Secrets in 'A Doll's House'

In Ibsen's text ‘A Doll’s House’ secrets are a problem for the main female character Nora. She does not understand the difference between white lies and big lies or secrets. Nora often keeps small secrets from her family, such as when she didn’t want to tell them what gifts she bought or when she didn’t want the children to see the room before it was decorated for Christmas. These secrets and lies are acceptable as they do not have a significant impact on their lives. However for the last eight years she has been keeping a huge secret from her family. The secret is she borrowed money to save Helmer. Not only has she not told anybody about the secret she also forged her father’s signature to get the money from Krogstad.

Her husband disapproves of borrowing money and he is always talking about how much he dislikes Krogstad  as he forged a document long ago. Nora is afraid her secret will come out and ruin her life and relationship with Helmer. In the end her secret does come out but by the end of the text she has come to terms with her crime. She understands that the truth had to come to light and she knows that had Helmer not found out she would have never seen the side of him that surface when he was presented with all the facts. 

Nora keeps many secrets from her husband but does not seem to be so closed off with other people. She is very open with Christine and Krogstad. Nora seems almost proud to tell Christine about what she has done. the same thing happens when Krogstad confronts her about forging her father's signature. Once she has been found out she was proud to tell Krogstad that she did commit the crime. Nora and Dr Rank also seem to have a more open relationship then Nora and Helmer. They keep their own secrets from Helmer and Nora seems to confide in him more then she confides in Helmer. Dr Rank knows more about Christine then Helmer as though Dr Rank and Nora have more open conversations about her past.

Both Nora and Helmer seem to keep keep their fantasies about each other a secret. It was kept a secret until near the end of the text when they both revealed their fantasy. They both hoped that Helmer would have a chance to save Nora. Helmer was given the chance to save her but he did not take this chance. In the end Helmer ended up doing the complete opposite to what they both hoped would happen.




Secrets in King Lear and A Dolls House
There are secret in both King Lear and Rear Window. In Rear Window the secret is a murder. In the apartment across from Jeff a man Thorwald had killed his wife in the middle of the night. Jeff hears the scream and assumes the wife has been killed. Jeff and Lisa know that the wife has been killed but they have no proof.  In King Lear however the secret is the two sisters Goneril and Regan are plotting against their father. Once Lear gave away his land he no longer had any value in the eyes of his daughters. Neither of them wants to have to lok after him or deal with all of his knights in their house. They plot against Lear to get rid of all of his knights and in the end they turn him insane.

In both texts we see love being kept a secret. Jeff cannot tell everyone that he is in love with lisa as they are not married. Lisa decides to sleep over but when she does this we see Jeff keeping them a secret as two unmarried people sleeping together was against social protocol. We also see Thorwald keeping his girlfriend a secret from his wife. in the end this is the reason he killed his wife. Similar to Thorwald, Goneril  in King Lear must keep her feelings for Edmund the son of Gloucester a secret. Goneril is in a loveless marriage with her husband Albany. When she meets Edmund she feels for the first time in her life what love is really like. At this point she no longer wants to be married. Goneril and Edmund secretly plot against Albany in the hopes that one of them can kill him. However Goneril does not know that Edmund is also secretly housing feelings for her sister Regan whose Husband has just died.

In King Lear we see many cases of hidden identities. Both Edgar and Kent have been banished but they both stay in the kingdom but in hiding. Edgar disguises himself as Poor Tom and Kent disguises himself as one of Lear's servants.The fact that they are both there adds dramatic irony to the text as Lear and Gloucester think they are talking to strangers but they are actually talking to an old friend and in Gloucester's case he is speaking to his son. He gets a chance to apologize to his son for banishing him from the kingdom. In the end it is Edgar who saves his father as he stops him from committing suicide on the cliffs of Dover.