When a child's favorite toy breaks, the child is usually overcome with emotion and unable to function. When that child becomes an adult, the proverbial toy represents that adult's social life, and as with the toy, the adult is protective of it and tries to keep it from breaking. It is no mistake that Henrik Ibsen titled his play A Doll's House, the toy house being a symbol of carefully constructed and maintained adult social structures. At the end of the show, the toy is almost destroyed, as typical gender roles are destroyed by a revolutionary woman named Nora. Yet Ibsen ruined his perfect progressive literature by writing a second ending; Nora, originally destined to leave and become an emancipated person, sees her children sleeping, collapses meekly in the doorway, and decides that she should remain an unfortunate housewife for the children's sake. As shown in Errol Durbach's Critical Reception, people did not accept his original progressive literature, insisting on writing this alternate ending to appease their social views. It seems that by writing an alternative ending, Ibsen is making himself and his work succumb to negative social pressure, just as the rewritten Nora did. For those who haven't read the rewritten ending, the change is small in action, but momentous in the message the show delivers. With the new ending, the valiant and dynamic Nora transforms back into the obedient and dependent Nora; The clock strikes midnight and Nora is reduced to what she has always been forced to be. All that needs to be written for Nora to change her mind is: "Tomorrow, when they wake up and call for their mother, they [the children] will be without a mother" (Ibsen). Those few lines are magically given the power to re... in the center of the paper... the face of change. Yet, for better or worse, change shapes humanity. The alternate ending isn't simply words on a page. Instead, it is a reflection of society's hesitancy to change and how long it will take to remain stagnant. The fact that the alternate ending is now seen as irrelevant and cowardly shows how society has grown to accept a courageous and individualistic Nora. Although it took several years, Henrik Ibsen finally gained praise and acceptance, letting the second ending be seen for what it is: an alternative to something better. Works Cited “Critical Reception.” A Doll's House: Ibsen's Myth of Transformation. Errol Durbach. Boston: Twayne, 1988. 13-23. Twayne's masterpiece studies 75. Twayne's authors on GVRL. Network. 7 February 2014.Ibsen, Henrik. A doll's house. All about Henrik Ibsen. National Library of Norway, 2014. Web. February. 8, 2014.