Teacups and Butter: The Importance of Eating in Ibsen’s A Doll’s House and The Wild Duck

ABSTRACT: This article examines the significance of food and drink in Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll House and The Wild Duck, arguing that Ibsen’s staging of physical consumption is an integral part of his innovative realistic dramatic technique. In both plays, food, literally incorporated into the bodies of the actors, functions as an insistent reminder of physicality. Yet, simultaneously, food items like Nora’s macaroons and Hjalmar Ekdal’s bread and butter serve as symbols of the psychological state of individual characters and of the nature and quality of their relationships. Nora’s consumption of macaroons in defiance of her husband’s ban on sweets indicates the potential for resistance in the charmingly shallow housewife and locates the site of that resistance in her body. Unlike Nora, Gina Ekdal denies herself food and drink in order to serve and subtly manipulate her voracious husband. Her model of gustatory self-sacrifice leads to her daughter Hedvig’s misguided attempt to feed her father’s affections with her suicide.