Nora, Capitu: encontros e desencontros

Abstract

The aim of this study is to anylise two literary works: Casa de Boneca (Doll's House) by Henrik Ibsen (1879) and Dom Casmurro by Machado de Assis (1899). The main idea was to verify if the crisis represented by the two female characters, Nora and Capitu, can be found nowadays. In other words, the objective is to identify the relationship between the artistic form and the real experience, focusing on situations as mirror games envolving life and art. Therefore, we will answer how the social and more specifically the family structure is reflected in the drama and in the romance of the 19 century. Based on the breaking of the social and the family actions, the profile of similarities and divergences between the characters that are inserted in the fiction, are captured and the domination of a patriarch emerges. From the crisis which made Nora leave home and provoked Capitu’s exile, a question arises: what type of social relationships are we able to construct under the inevitable circumstances of exclusion imposed by the capitalism society.