In The Glass Menagerie, Amanda is an over controlling mother and is trying to protect her children like any mother would but Laura and Tom depend on their mother's decision for them. For example, Just at the beginning of the play Amanda is talking to Laura and Tom about something that happened at church and while their eating dinner Amanda says “ Honey, don’t push with your fingers. If you have to push with something, the thing to push with is a crust of bread. And chew—chew! Animals have sections in their stomachs which enable them to digest food without mastication . . . . .” (Act 1, scene I, pg.925) Amanda is telling Laura and Tom how to eat and what to do when their eating I understand that from a mother point of view but they are old enough to know what to do and how to do it. Amanda treats them as of their children when their grown adults. A mother always wants the best for her children, and Amanda isn’t a good example of a good mother. Amanda talks to Laura and Tom about their father as of she made a mistake choosing him out of a lot of men that wanted to be with her. “And I could have been Mrs. Duncan J. Fitzhugh, mind you! But – I picked your father” (Act 1, scene 1, pg.927). Amanda is using her past experience and wants men to call Laura like many did for her “Its almost time for our gentlemen callers to start arriving. How many do you suppose were going to entertain this afternoon?” (Act1, scene 1, pg. 927) Amanda doesn’t want Laura to make the same mistake she did by choosing the wrong guy like she made it seem about Laura’s father. Pressuring Laura to get out their and find someone I don’t think is a good mother thing to do and clearly just wants her daughter to find someone with a future for the sake of the family... ... middle of paper ... ...mportant to you, what am doing – what I want to – having a little difference between them!” (act 1, scene 3, pg. 934). “You think I am crazy about the warehouse? You think I am in love with the continental shoemaker? You think I want to spend fifty-five years down there in that – celotex interior! . . . . I say to myself, “How lucky dead people are!” but I get up. I go! For sixty-five dollars a month I give up all that I dream of doing and being ever! And you say self—self’s all I ever think of. “ (Act1, scene 3, pg.935) Tom clearly expresses how his mother has made him feel, trapped and manipulated to do what she wanted and everything how she wants things done around her. Tom had mettle to stay around through the hard times with so much pressure and craziness from his mother, but not to long he decides to leave his mother and sister unfortunately without a husband.
Adversity can cause an individual to overcome their challenges and strengthen their identity, however, it can also have the opposite negative effect. Adversity can trigger an individual to lose their identity in their attempt to escape from their problems. In the play, A Streetcar Named Desire, by Tennessee Williams, Blanche DuBois is unable to face adversity, which leads her to lose her individual identity during her attempt to escape reality. Blanche had experienced numerous hardships such as the deaths of many family members and the loss of her young husband, Allan. Instead of overcoming these challenges and becoming stronger, Blanche tried to run away from them.
Amanda is also well characterized by the glass menagerie. The glass sits in a case, open for display and inspection for all. Amanda try’s to portray herself as a loving mother, doing everything she can for her children, and caring nothing for herself, when in fact, she is quite selfish and demanding. Amanda claims that she devotes her life to her children, and that she would do anything for them, but is very suspicious of Tom’s activities, and continually pressures Tom, trying to force him in finding a gentleman caller for Laura, believing that Laura is lonely and needs a companion, perhaps to get married. Like the glass, her schemes are very transparent, and people can see straight through them to the other side, where ...
The story 'A View From The Bridge', is set in the 1940's in Red hook
Laura's mother and brother shared some of her fragile tendencies. Amanda, Laura's mother, continually lives in the past. Her reflection of her teenage years continually haunts Laura. To the point where she forces her to see a "Gentleman Caller" it is then that Tom reminds his mother not to "expect to much of Laura" she is unlike other girls. But Laura's mother has not allowed herself nor the rest of the family to see Laura as different from other girls. Amanda continually lives in the past when she was young a pretty and lived on the plantation. Laura must feel she can never live up to her mothers expectations. Her mother continually reminds her of her differences throughout the play.
What is in the spring of your life if the spring of a life refers to your first twenty years in your life? The Bell Jar, a semi-autobiographical novel by Silvia Plath, describes Esther Greenwood’s harsh spring of her life. Narrating in the first person, Esther tells her experience of a mental breakdown in a descriptive language, helping the readers visualize what she sees and feel her emotions. The novel takes place in New York City and Boston during the early 1950s when women’s roles were limited to domesticity. The repression of women’s roles in the American society during the 1950s and other influences such as her lack of confidence, her hesitance, her mother, and her feminist point of view seem to affect her mental breakdown.
Amanda Wingfield is mother of Tom and Laura. She is a middle-aged southern belle whose husband has abandoned her. She spends her time reminiscing about the past and nagging her children. Amanda is completely dependent on her son Tom for finical security and holds him fully responsible for her daughter Laura's future. Amanda is obsessed with her past as she constantly reminds Tom and Laura of that " one Sunday afternoon in Blue Mountain when she once received seventeen gentlemen callers" (pg.32). The reader cannot even be sure that this actually happened. However, it is clear that despite its possible falsity, Amanda has come to believe it. Amanda also refuses to acknowledge that her daughter Laura is crippled and refers to her handicap as " a little defect-hardly noticeable" (pg.45). Only for brief moments does she ever admit that her daughter is crippled and then she resorts back into to her world of denial and delusion. Amanda puts the weight of Laura's success in life on her son Tom's shoulders. When Tom finally finds a man to come over to the house for diner and meet Laura, Amanda blows the situation way out of proportion. She believes that this gentlemen caller, Jim, is going to be the man to rescue Laura. When in fact neither herself nor Laura has even met this man Jim yet. She tries to explain to Laura how to entertain a gentleman caller; she says-talking about her past " They knew how to entertain their gentlemen callers. It wasn't enough for a girl to be possessed of a pretty face and a graceful figure although I wasn't slighted in either respect.
"And Pecola. She hid behind hers. (Ugliness) Concealed, veiled, eclipsed--peeping out from behind the shroud very seldom, and then only to yearn for the return of her mask" (Morrison 39). In the novel The Bluest Eye, by Toni Morrison, the main character, Pecola, comes to see herself as ugly. This idea she creates results from her isolation from friends, the community, and ever her family. There are three stages that lead up to Pecola portraying herself as an ugly human being. The three stages that lead to Pecola's realization are her family's outlook toward her, the community members telling her she is ugly, and her actually accepting what the other say or think about her. Each stage progresses into the other to finally reach the last stage and the end of the novel when Pecola eventually has to rely on herself as an imaginary friend so she will have someone to talk to.
Beauty is dangerous, especially when you lack it. In the book "The Bluest Eye" by Toni Morrison, we witness the effects that beauty brings. Specifically the collapse of Pecola Breedlove, due to her belief that she did not hold beauty. The media in the 1940's as well as today imposes standards in which beauty is measured up to; but in reality beauty dwells within us all whether it's visible or not there's beauty in all; that beauty is unworthy if society brands you with the label of being ugly.
There are many themes that seem to run throughout this story. Each theme and conflict seems to always involve the character of Pecola Breedlove. There is the theme of finding an identity. There is also the theme of Pecola as a victim. Of all the characters in the story we can definitely sympathize with Pecola because of the many harsh circumstances she has had to go through in her lifetime. Perhaps her rape was the most tragic and dramatic experience Pecola had experiences, but nonetheless she continued her life. She eliminates her sense of ugliness, which lingers in the beginning of the story, and when she sees that she has blue eyes now she changes her perspective on life. She believes that these eyes have been given to her magically and in some respects her eyes begin to corrupt her as an individual. The story begins to take a turn and the reader realizes that the main character has begun to entirely rely on self-image in order to build confidence. This leads to the question of how significant are the "Blue eyes" to society and how does the theme of beauty and ugliness linger throughout the story. With this in mind, how does this make Pecola a victim of society and a victim in herself?
In Tennessee Williams’ 1947 play, “A Streetcar Named Desire,” Stella and Stanley Kowalski live in the heart of poor, urban New Orleans in a one-story flat very different from the prestigious home Stella came from. This prestige is alive and well inside Stella’s lady-like sister, Blanche Du Bois. Over the course of Blanche’s life, she has experienced many tragedies that deeply affected her, such as the death of her gay husband, the downward spiral in her mental health that followed, and most recently the loss of her wealth and therefore social status. She constructs a proverbial lampshade to mask her pain and to control the last part of her world that she is able to, the image she projects into the world for herself and others to see. The brooding prince of William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” chooses a very similar way of coping with the hand life has dealt him. When his mother remarries his uncle only a month after his father’s passing, the ghost of Hamlet’s father visits the young prince demanding avengement. These events cause Hamlet to try to replace the old lampshade that helped him cope with reality by changing his own image and fooling himself and others into thinking he’s crazy. An examination of both plays reveals that the importance of subjective truths and the way in which Blanche and Hamlet use them to cope transcends the context of both plays.
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.
Social class is a major theme in the book The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison. Toni Morrison is saying that there are dysfunctional families in every social class, though people only think of it in the lower class. Toni Morrison was also stating that people also use social class to separate themselves from others and apart from race; social class is one thing Pauline and Geraldine admire.Claudia, Pecola, and Frieda are affected by not only their own social status, but others social status too - for example Geraldine and Maureen Peal. Characters in the book use their social class as another reason for being ugly. Readers are reminded of the theme every time a new character enters into the book.
In almost every family, the sons will look to their father as a role model and a hero, which in this case Biff does, but Happy does not. It is in the father’s best interest to use this opportunity to give these qualities and allow his sons to become responsible individuals. The relationship between mother and daughter in William’s play is a big one. Essentially, Amanda wishes that her daughter, Laura, were exactly like her. The problem is that this could not be further from reality.
At first glance, Amanda Wingfield from Tennessee Williams’s The Glass Menagerie seems like a selfish women stuck in her past. In some ways this observation is correct; however, she is much more than that. Her kind and caring nature, and her insatiable love for her children has been overshadowed by her brash and insensitive dialogue. Her character is extremely complex and each one her actions reveals more of her overwhelming personality. Amanda loves her children and tries her best to make sure they do not follow in her path to downfall. Unfortunately, while she is trying to push her children toward her ideals of success; she is also pushing them away. Amanda Wingfield is a kind women stuck the wrong place and time; she
written in between 384 and 222 BC, and his views were taken on by some