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A streetcar named desire- characterization of Blanche
A streetcar named desire- characterization of Blanche
Symbolism of the streetcar in a streetcar named desire
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In Scene 11 of the play, Stella and Stanley have made arrangements for Blanche. They are planning on sending off Blanche to an asylum. Blanche expects Shep Huntleigh from Dallas to meet her. When a doctor and nurse arrive at the Kowalski Apartment instead of the gentleman, Blanche becomes hysterical. The takes off his hat and approaches Blanche, and tells the nurse that a jacket to restrain her will not be necessary. The doctor calms Blanche down and escorts her out of her room. Before leaving with the doctor and nurse, Blanche says, “I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.”
In Tennessee Williams' play, A Streetcar Named Desire, Williams uses the suicide of Blanche's husband to illuminate Blanche's insecurities and immoral behavior. When something terrible happens to someone, it often reveals who he or she truly is. Blanche falls victim to this behavior, and she fails to face her demons. This displays how the play links a character’s illogical choices and their inner struggles.
Identity in Contemporary American Drama – Between Reality and Illusion Tennessee Williams was one of the most important playwrights in the American literature. He is famous for works such as “The Glass Menagerie” (1944), “A Streetcar Named Desire” (1947) or “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955)”. As John S. Bak claims: “Streetcar remains the most intriguing and the most frequently analyzed of Williams’ plays.” In the lines that follow I am going to analyze how the identity of Blanche DuBois, the female character of his play, “A Streetcar Named Desire”, is shaped. Firstly, we learn from an interview he gave, that the character of Blanche has been inspired from a member of his family.
The dawn of the twentieth century beheld changes in almost every aspect of the day-to-day lives of women, from the domestic domain to the public. By the midpoint of the twentieth century, women 's activities and concerns had been recognized by the society in previously male-dominating world. The end of the nineteenth century saw tremendous growth in the suffrage movement in England and the United States, with women struggling to attain political equality. However, this was not to last however, and by the fifties men had reassumed their more dominant role in society. Tennessee Williams wrote A Streetcar Named Desire around the time this reversal was occurring in American society. In this play male dominance is clear. Women are represented as
When discussing the notion that “Love can often lead to the creation of an ‘Outsider’." there are cases in our literary examples that would agree with the statement, and some that would not. Outsiders in Much Ado About Nothing, Pride and Prejudice and A Streetcar Named Desire are created by both love and other themes, whether it be class, power, disinterest or a scandal.
During early times men were regarded as superior to women. In Tennessee William’s play, “A Streetcar Named Desire”, Stanley Kowalski, the work’s imposing antagonist, thrives on power. He embodies the traits found in a world of old fashioned ideals where men were meant to be dominant figures. This is evident in Stanley’s relationship with Stella, his behavior towards Blanche, and his attitude towards women in general. He enjoys judging women and playing with their feelings as well.
2. What causes Mitch and Blanche to take a "certain interest" in one another? That is, what is the source of their immediate attraction? What seems to draw them together? What signs are already present to suggest that their relationship is doomed/problematic?
Everyone has experienced a situation in life where it's like a rug has been pulled out from under them. Well, T. Williams’ novel A Streetcar Named Desire portrays a similar situation of three unconventional characters whose reality is not the American Dream that they are striving for. Blanche, Stella, and Stanley approach life hoping for different outcomes in their lives. But what is the American Dream they were striving for? Simply put, by looking at the principles of America, the primary dream for everyone is to have a well-lived life. For some people this includes a family, success, happiness, independence, money, and love. If these are T. Williams’ constructs of the American Dream, then Stella and Stanley Kowalski may never find their
Scene One of A Streetcar Named Desire What is the dramatic significance of scene one of the play A Streetcar named Desire? Scene 1 of this play has great dramatic significance. In this essay, I will be looking at key points throughout the scene that reveal the key features of the plot, characters, theme and imagery plus how it is used to give the audience a taster for what is to come.
Up until the moment she sees the doctor at the end of the play, she is convinced her former man, Shep Huntleigh, now a millionaire, is coming to get her and take her away to a life of stability and ease. As the doctor leads her away she says, “I’ve always depended on the kindness of strangers.” This deluded calmness and happiness that Blanche has while being lead away to the insane asylum she still doesn’t know about, is suggestive that despite reality’s eventual and definite victory, fantasy is a strong and vital thing that is used by all individually in their own circumstances. Williams uses Blanche as one way to demonstrate and explore his points on the tragedy of reality versus
...ehavior is after her and Stanley have an inappropriate encounter (possibly raped her). After that point the audience knew that after that point, Blanche could no longer stay at Stella and Stanley's apartment. Considering all of these circumstances, how can any rational being claim that anyone but Blanche is the sympathetic character?
She looks for empathy in all the wrong places. She looks for it when with strangers, with Stanley, Mitch, and Stella. The tragedy of Alan’s death is a leading cause for Blanche’s desire for attention and empathy. After his death he becomes involved with the hotel “flamingo”. It is here where she mistakenly thinks that sex, is a form of empathy. This empathy causes her character to have a blackened image of how to gain empathy from others. Once she gets run out of the flamingo she attempts to gain attention from Stanley. “It 's mine, too. It 's hard to stay looking fresh. I haven 't washed or even powdered my face and here you are!” Blanche understands that Stanley is a man who can at least support his wife. She flirts with Stanley, in a desperate need to feel, safe and cared for. Stanley understands that Blanche is manipulative, and he does not give empathy towards her. The tragic Irony with Blanche is that she does not recognize true empathy when it is given to her, Mitch has a deep care for Blanche, to the extent that he is willing to marry her. “You need somebody. And I need somebody, too. Could it be—you and me, Blanche?” Mitch shows a great amount of compassion towards Blanche, but blanche cannot recognize this empathy and sees it more as an opportunity to manipulate him, which doesn’t turn out well in the end. Stella is the
To conclude, the author portrays Blanche’s deteriorating mental state throughout the play and by the end it has disappeared, she is in such a mental state that doctors take her away. Even at this stage she is still completely un-aware of her surroundings and the state she is in herself.
As Stanley continues torturing Blanche and draws Stella and Mitch away from her, Blanche’s sanity slowly dwindles. Even though she lied throughout the play, her dishonesty becomes more noticeable and irrational due to Stanley's torment about her horrible past. After dealing with the deaths of her whole family, she loses Belle Reve, the estate on which her and her sister grew up. This is too much for Blanche to handle causing her moral vision to be blurred by “her desperate need to be with someone, with ancestors for models who indulged in “epic fornications” with impunity, [Blanche] moves through the world filling the void in her life with lust” (Kataria 2). She also loses a young husband who killed himself after she found out he was gay when she caught him with another man. After that traumatic experience she needed “a cosy nook to squirm herself into because ...
The past is every occurrence before the present; it is set and it cannot be changed. It plays a crucial role in shaping a person’s character and future. The protagonist in A Streetcar Named Desire, Blanche DuBois, goes through an initial loss of identity seen through the homosexuality of her husband; this is displayed through the way Blanche reacts to his suicide, and finally can be found in the current situation that she has placed herself in. Blanche reinvents herself by moving to New Orleans where her sister Stella lives and develops a new personality. In Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire, the author displays how ones individuality can be lost when the uncertainties of the past cause that individual to reconcile that identity
One cant imagine how it must feel to lose the ones they love and hold dear, but to stay afterwards and mourn the loss of the many is unbearable. Blanche has had a streak of horrible luck. Her husband killing himself after she exposed her knowledge about his homosexuality, her advances on young men that led to her exile and finally her alcoholism that drew her life to pieces contemplated this sorrow that we could not help but feel for Blanche throughout the drama. Blanche’s desire to escape from this situation is fulfilled when she is taken away to the insane asylum. There she will have peace when in the real world she only faces pain.