Comparison Of Tom's Memory In The Glass Menagerie

Aaron Coash

Mrs. Ditton

CC English

26 February 2018

Escaping The Glass Menagerie Life

In the 1930’s, Tennessee Williams used The Glass Menagerie as a way to reveal his past to the world due to how closely it mimicked his own life. The play is said to be more of an autobiography and a way for Tennessee Williams to express his childhood. By creating a memory play, Williams can elaborate on his own memories to explore new themes. A memory play is most widely known as a play told from the perspective of a character and it is restricted by the memory of the character chosen. In 1973, Anthony Harvey directs an adaptation of Williams’ classic. Both works combine to enhance original ideas of dialogue and imagery. In Tennessee Williams's play, “The

Characterization for a memory play can be manipulated or skewed to the narrator's discretion. In “The Glass Menagerie”, Tom is the narrator and telling the reader of his memory. He could be telling the audience the truth about how his family acted or he could be exaggerating his memory of them. To the readers understanding, Tom portrays his mother as a hound and reminisces in the past. For example, the play shows Amanda bragging about her gentlemen callers like in scene two when she says, “I wore this dress when i met you father and met 17 gentlemen callers that summer”(Williams). This depicts Amanda as a person that is trapped in her past. Amanda has had her glory days and now that her life has settled down she only dreams of her nostalgic past. Tom’s memories allow us to believe that Laura is unusual in some way. In the written play, Williams lets the audience know that Tom remembers trying to help his mother understand that Laura doesn't have gentlemen callers because she is weird, but states “we cannot see it because we know Laura and love her” (Williams). Tom’s memory of this scene is unique to Tom and could have been taken very different by his mother. The reader is only seeing Toms perspective and when keeping that in mind, the audience must challenge if he is telling the truth. If Amanda was telling her memory of this specific moment, then different words and feelings would be magnified to her discretion because she took the thought as though someone had just cursed at her. Amanda angrily mentions, “her differences only make her that much more unique” (Williams). Now, in the visual representation of the play the staging and acting of the characters can be seen. The TV movie kept all the details and music the same as Tennessee Williams vision when first writing the play. Anthony Harvey used the song “The Glass Menagerie” when