The Glass Menagerie:Tom Wingdfield
The story takes place from an indefinite point in the future; the events of the play are framed by memories. Tom Wingfield usually smokes and stands on the fire escape as he delivers his monologues. Tom remembers the winter and spring of 1937 in their apartment in St. Louis. The play is sentimental and not realistic. The main characters in this play are Amanda Wingfield appears to be a faded southern belle that has delusions of grandeur, controlling, pushy, a bit overwhelming, and is stuck in the past and how things used to be. She has been abandoned by what I understood to be her husband and the father of her two children Laura and Tom. Laura is the daughter of Amanda and the older sister of Tom that is slightly impaired not only physically but mentally. She lets her limp make her self-conscious, insecure and fragile –from this she has isolated herself from the outside world only interacting with her mother who treats her like a child and is very forceful and pushy with her and her brother who tries to treat her like there is nothing wrong with her, but he too treats her as fragile minded little girl. Tom is the son of Amanda and the younger brother of Laura. Tom is the narrator and the protagonist of the play, yet he is also a character in it. He is a worker at a shoe warehouse to support his sister and mother and himself. He despises his job and secretly wants to pursue his dream of being a poet. He wants to get away from his mother and sister and live his own life, but he is trapped by his guilt and not wanting to leave his sister. He fears that is he leaves they won’t be able to sustain themselves in their apartment seeing as since their father abandoned his mother he has taken over the ro...
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...er. I think Tom is much braver than me, but that might be because he is a male. It is more acceptable for a male to leave home and start his own life whereas with a female they tend to not leave so abruptly. I feel guilty because she has told me many times about how she came to become my mother and that she gave up her life to raise me and give me the best opportunities that she could being a single mother. I am very grateful for her and appreciate her probably more than she realizes. Also, I feel guilty because I am the only thing left she has of her, “daughter, (my mother)”. I know that if anything did happen to me such as me too getting into a car accident she would lose her mind completely. Amanda is bipolar I do believe and I would like to think my mother is as well. They have many alike traits which is another way I and Tom connect and have sort of kinship.
The characters inhabit their private realities in order to detach themselves from a world that confuses and alienates them. Laura, Amanda, Tom, and Jim prefer to immerse themselves in their narrow view of time rather than embrace the flow of time. Laura remains isolated as she has failed to find love. Amanda judges Laura as she imposes her own narrow expectations on her. Tom believes that he can escape reality and become inseparable from the imaginary worlds of movies. Jim's idealistic view of Laura suggests that he is out of touch with reality. The play demonstrates that the characters desire to escape reality due to their inability to live in the present and embrace the flow of
The play deals with the issues faced by young people growing up through the eyes of two children, Tilly and Ben. About to begin year eight and head off to boarding school, these two twins are full of anxieties, hopes, and fears about the future. They have built their own imaginary world, where they spend most of the time imagining what will happen. The play is very relatable to anyone who has been concerned about transition, and who has an imagination. But it fails to keep its audience engaged. Though it is aimed at teenagers, and manages to deal very weel with the issues it discusses, it does not do enough to hold its audience. It is not a slapstick comedy, like most productions aimed at young people. Neither does it seek to hold its audience emotionally. So it’s not a tragedy. Or a comedy. Or a tragicomedy. So what is it? It’s a literary
In The Glass Menagerie, by Tennessee Williams, the glass menagerie is a clear and powerful metaphor for each of the four characters, Tom, Laura, Amanda, and the Gentleman Caller. It represents their lives, personality, emotions, and other important characteristics.
Reality is hard to face, when everything going on around a person is not in the greatest conditions. The Wingfield family does not live in the greatest conditions. Tom, Amanda and Laura all live in an apartment together. Tom, the main character and narrator of the play, is the brother to Laura and the son to Amanda. Tom is forced to take on the role of the breadwinner of the family because his father left them. This has thrown the entire family off the rails. It has altered the reality in which all of the characters live. In Tennessee Williams’ play, “The Glass Menagerie”, The Wingfield family has difficulty differentiating reality versus non-reality. The world we are living in today relates
Every time the family comes to a confrontation someone retreats to the past and reflects on life as it was back then, not dealing with life as it is for them today. Tom, assuming the macho role of the man of the house, babies and shelters Laura from the outside world. His mother reminds him that he is to feel a responsibility for his sister. He carries this burden throughout the play. His mother knows if it were not for his sisters needs he would have been long gone. Laura must pickup on some of this, she is so sensitive she must sense Toms feeling of being trapped. Tom dreams of going away to learn of the world, Laura is aware of this and she is frightened of what may become of them if he were to leave.
The theme of the play has to do with the way that life is an endless cycle. You're born, you have some happy times, you have some bad times, and then you die. As the years pass by, everything seems to change. But all in all there is little change. The sun always rises in the early morning, and sets in the evening. The seasons always rotate like they always have. The birds are always chirping. And there is always somebody that has life a little bit worse than your own.
The Glass Menagerie is an eposidic play written by Tennesse Williams reflecting the economic status and desperation of the American people in the 30s.He portrays three different characters going through these hardships of the real world,and choosing different ways to escape it.Amanada,the mother,escapes to the memories of the youth;Tom watches the movies to provide him with the adventure he lacks in his life;and laura runs to her glass menagerie.
The Character of Tom Wingfield in The Glass Menagerie Tom Wingfield is a determined young man. He has decided against everyone else in his family's wishes that he wants to leave the dismal life of a factory job, to pursue a chance in the Merchant Marines. He realizes that he would be running off like his father and this is probably the only thing that kept him from leaving this long. Amanda, Tom's mother, deep down knows the day is coming that Tom will leave. She says "But not till there's someone to take your place."
Memories seldom show reality as it occurs; instead, they exaggerate and emphasize the feelings of the event and forget the rest. [PP3] In Tennessee Williams’s “The Glass Menagerie,” the memories of Tom Wingfield are layered with symbols of how he wishes to be free from his current life and the slow realization that he will never truly be free from his ties to the very household that drug him down. The prime examples of the symbolism shown in this memory play are Tom’s trips to the movies, Jim as a character, and the extinguishing of the candles.
In Tennessee Williams' play, The Glass Menagerie, each member of the Wingfield family has their own fantasy world in which they indulge themselves. Tom escaped temporarily from the fantasy world of Amanda and Laura by hanging out on the fire escape. Suffocating both emotionally and spiritually, Tom eventually sought a more permanent form of escape.
The three family members are adults at the time of this play, struggling to be individuals, and yet, very enmeshed and codependent with one another. The overbearing and domineering mother, Amanda, spends much of her time reliving the past; her days as a southern belle. She desperately hopes her daughter, Laura, will marry. Laura suffers from an inferiority complex partially due to a minor disability that she perceives as a major one. She has difficulty coping with life outside of the apartment, her cherished glass animal collection, and her Victrola. Tom, Amanda's son, resents his role as provider for the family, yearns to be free from him mother's constant nagging, and longs to pursue his own dreams. A futile attempt is made to match Laura with Jim, an old high school acquaintance and one of Tom's work mates.
The play’s major conflict is the loneliness experienced by the two elderly sisters, after outliving most of their relatives. The minor conflict is the sisters setting up a tea party for the newspaper boy who is supposed to collect his pay, but instead skips over their house. The sisters also have another minor conflict about the name of a ship from their father’s voyage. Because both sisters are elderly, they cannot exactly remember the ships name or exact details, and both sisters believe their version of the story is the right one. Although it is a short drama narration, Betty Keller depicts the two sisters in great detail, introduces a few conflicts, and with the use of dialogue,
...o have an employed man in her life. Amanda served as a perfect model to exemplify this belief, and the way that Williams’ makes use of naturalistic themes in his play. He proves that without a strong man in the house to support Amanda and Laura, the women would not survive. While Amanda tries to raise her children without a husband, she exhibits many naturalist mannerisms. Williams’ reveals examples of Charles Darwin’s theories of “survival of the fittest”, and of natural selection through Amanda, and her interactions with her son, her daughter, and her character and disposition. Williams’ also demonstrates the naturalistic principle that character traits and personalities are hereditary. Tom Wingfield was the main provider for the family, and when he followed his father’s footsteps and abandoned Laura and Amanda, the women were left unaided and hopeless.
of - was charm!' - or trails off - 'And then I - (she stops in front
Amanda, like Laura, wants Tom to strive for is full potential and be all that he can be. Their relationship is strained because Tom reminds Amanda of her husband. He just does not quite fit in with the rest of his family. He aspires to travel and see the world. He does not want to just get by; he wants to live and experience life. Amanda sees this in his and acknowledges that he has the same flighty attitude as his father. Mrs Wingfield snaps at her son and exclaims, “Oh, I can see the handwriting on the wall as plain as I see the nose in front of my face! It’s terrifying! More and more you remind me of your father! He was out all hours without explanation—Then left! Goodbye! And me with the bag to hold. He is the major breadwinner in the family. He brings in all the income and if he leaves Amanda and Laura will not be able to make it. Amanda takes it upon herself to mold Tom into the man that she wished her husband was. Of course, he takes it upon himself to be anything but. He spends every night at the movies. Tom uses the movies as a form of escape form his home life and satisfy his urge to leave and explore. He says, “People go to the movies instead of moving.” Tom is more of a realist compared to Amanda’s hopeful view on life. He knows life will never measure up to his mother’s expectations. The world has changed and he feels his mother needs to wake up. His personality is a direct contrast