| Summary: | At the beginning of the 20th Century, Ibsen plays had been very popular, both in Japan and in China. Nora, the heroin of A Doll’s House, had widely influenced young intellectuals in both societies. In Japan, young intellectual women published the magazine Seitō in 1911, applauded Nora’s leaving home as the liberation of woman from the autocracy of men. In China, young intellectual men published the magazine Xīn Qīngnián, in 1915, and had also applauded Nora as the liberation of the men from the old idea of marriage. In Japan, the majority of men and the mass media scorned the members of Seitō as disrupting the traditional family. In China, the young intellectual men accepting the new idea of free love divorced their old-fashioned wives who bound their feet and lacked education. Both in Japan and in China, there was a great disparity between women and men in the reception of new ideas.
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