A Dolls House” and “The Glass Menagerie Essay Example

week and doesn’t let her eat her favorite things, macaroons.

Along with the character flaws in “A Doll’s House”, there are also some character flaws in “The Glass Menagerie”. One of the characters that has a flaw is Amanda. Her biggest flaw is that she is dependent on her son.She doesn’t really have a good, steady job so she depends on Tom to work and pay the bills.

The problem with this is that Tom can’t move out and carry on with his dream of becoming a merchant marine because he would leave his mother and sister with nothing. Laura is also dependent of her brother. Unlike her mom who sells magazines over the phone, Laura has no job and doesn’t contribute anything financially to the household. Along with not working, she is a very shy person. She doesn’t make friends easily and doesn’t make any attempts to date anyone.

What makes her shy is her insecurities about her disability. Along with character flaws in each of the plays, they both dealt with abandonment. In the play “A Doll’s House”, Nora abandons her husband and children in order to find out who she really is. She realizes towards the end of the play that she has always been dependent on others and doesn’t feel that that is what makes a good wife or mother. She feels that she can’t take care of her family if she can’t take care of herself and decides it would be best for her family if she just left.

Also in “A Doll’s House”, Kristine leaves Krogstad for an opportunity to marry a very rich man. She decides to marry the rich

man because her family was going through some difficult times and she thought that she could help her family by marrying him for his money. About six years after they married, her husband died and left her with nothing so she came back home in order to try and find a job. In the play “The Glass Menagerie”, there are two characters that abandon their families, Laura’s father, and Tom himself later on in the play.

Tom and Laura’s father abandoned them when they were younger because he “fell in love with long distance” (Williams 1074). Later on in the play after struggling with his dreams to become a merchant marine and having to work in a warehouse just to support his mother and sister, Tom finally works up the courage to leave his family and fulfill his own dreams and aspirations. Nora’s character changes toward the end of the play by starting to depend more on herself. Throughout the play, Nora was always dependent on her husband, Torvald.She takes out a loan earlier in the play in order to take her husband to the warmer climate.

Torvald was ill and the only thing that could save him would be time spent away from the cold. Nora never tells Torvald about this loan because he doesn’t believe in borrowing. Toward the end of the play when Torvald finds out about the loan, his true colors come out and Nora finally gets to see what her husband is really like. This is what really causes Nora to leave her family and to try to find who she really is.This situation also causes Torvald to change a little

as well. Near the end when Torvald finds out about the loan, he gets angry with Nora.

Once he learns that she is going to leave him and the children, he begins to change his ways a little and starts treating her with a little more respect. He hopes this will make Nora stay, but she already has her mind set and finally has control for once in her life. Along with the character transformation in “A Doll’s House”, Tom, from “The Glass Menagerie”, also goes through some character changes.Throughout the entire play, Tom was working in a warehouse trying to support his family. While working there, he was struggling with his dreams of becoming a merchant marine. Towards the end of the play, when Tom introduces his friend Jim O’Connor to his sister Laura, his mother hopes that this could be a man that Laura could settle down with and someday marry.

When Amanda finds out that Jim is already engaged, she blames Tom. She is furious that Tom brought a gentleman caller over without making sure he was available.She calls Tom selfish and says that he made them all look like fools. Tom finally gets fed up with all this because he has supported his family all these years, and they don’t seem to appreciate him. He feels that it is best for him to leave them on their own and to go after his own dreams in life.

As you can see, there is a common struggle between the call of duty and the desire to live ones life in both “A Doll’s House” and “The Glass Menagerie”. It is portrayed through

character traits and flaws, abandonment, and character transformation.