In the commencement of the play, Blanche is quickly described as a damsel in distress. She is portrayed as a wealthy woman “in a white suit with a fluffy bodice, necklace and earing of pearl, white gloves and hat…” (5). She resembles an embellished white moth. The fact that she is forced to live with her younger sister Stella and her domineering husband truly shows that Blanche is in a truly desperate situation. Her overall character is depicted as a traumatized woman that is in complete desolation. Experiences such as witnessing her family on a “...Long parade to the graveyard” (21). Being forced to live with your family until their tragic demise would emotionally and mentally torment anyone. She lives inside of her own world in which she…
The primary noticeable difference between Stanley and Blanche are the worlds that they both come from. Blanche believes in an illusionary world of which the upper and lower class people are separated, education is valued, races are separated and purity is preserved. In contrast, Stanley comes from a patriarchal society, which is morally corrupt, sinful and amoral. In the opening scene, the stage directions “her expression is one of shocked disbelief. Her appearance is incongruous to this setting” conveys her difference in class and how Blanche already does not fit into this new world foreshadowing the end of the play when Blanche is pushed out of the new world. The dialogue “ they mustn’t have- understood- what number I wanted” highlights Blanche’s confusion as she arrives at Elysian Fields, which suggests that Blanche is entering into a world that she does not belong in. The use of the derogatory terms “negro”, “brown” and “one white and one coloured” all suggest that unlike in Blanche’s illusionary world, Stanley’s world, New Orleans does not separate races instead they intermingle. Throughout the play there are many references to animalistic qualities. Blanche is represented, as a “moth” of which is fragile and attracted to light, which leads to danger and death. Stanley is compared to a lion, a predator of power and strong…
Even from the first few scenes of ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’, we can see that Blanche DuBois is a complicated character; throughout the play she ignores warnings and breaks moral codes, and it is this that leads to her demise of character.…
-In the end, Stanley's down-to-earth character proves harmfully crude and brutish. His chief amusements are gambling, bowling, sex, and drinking, and he lacks ideals and imagination. His disturbing, degenerate nature, first hinted at when he beats his wife, is fully evident after he rapes his sister-in-law. Stanley shows no remorse for his brutal actions. The play ends with an image of Stanley as the ideal family man, comforting his wife as she holds their newborn child. The wrongfulness of this representation, given what we have learned about him in the play, ironically calls into question society's decision to ostracize Blanche.…
Blanche DuBois is one of the central characters in Tennessee Williams’: “A Streetcar Named Desire”. She is the sister of Stella Kowalski, she is in her thirties and works as a school English teacher. Blanche can be described as many things; a “slut”, because of her relations with soldiers and numerous men in a hotel, a “predator”, because of her affair with a young school boy. However, a “victim” because of her gender would not be one that many would first think of or even agree with.…
Stanley's harsh, realistic world is often seen throughout the play this shows how different Blanches is. An example of this is Stanley's main interests: gambling, drinking, fighting, sex and bowling. All of these are very realistic things to do, very down to earth. Also throughout the play he shows no remorse for what he's done,…
The last element of literature that holds so much tragedy is the characters themselves. Blanche is a tragic, fading beauty. She has many tragic things happen to her in the play. Blanche before coming to New Orleans had an afair with one of her students.She ends up losing her mind and being commited to a mental instituition by the end of the play. Stella is abused by her husband both physically and mentally. She loves her husband even though he does that and will not leave him. Stanley is a inferior male that beats his wife. He treat his wife like she is good for only sex.…
At certain points you find yourself believing that Blanche will succeed in getting what she has been looking for. When Mitch falls for Blanche and speaks of marriage with her you see the potential of Blanche having a happy ending she has always wanted. The play then takes an unexpected turn. This feeling is pulled away from you when the animal act of rape dooms blanche. This is where the realization that blanche will never achieve her goals hits you. Instead of an outright death that would end the play, blanche is striped of her dignity. Stanley strips Blanche of any chance she has of fulfilling her dreams of having the perfect life and the perception that she is indeed what she has been portraying herself as.possibility of victory must be there in tragedy. Where pathos rules, where pathos is finally derived, a character has fought a battle he could not possibly have…
This play reflected a part of society that was frowned upon on a social level in the mid 20th centuary. Today a play like this is concidered normal, or average as far as the contrivisrail espects are concerned, but in the 40s a character like Blanche Dubois was something that challegned the moral of the ideal american family. This play is about Blanche DuBois, a schoolteacher from Laurel, Mississippi. She arrives in New Orleans to live with her sister, Stella Kowalski. Blanche told her sister that she lost their their ancestral home Belle Reve, following the death of all their remaining relatives and husband. She mentions that she has been given a leave of absence from her teaching position because of her bad nervous breakdowns.…
When the play begins, Blanche is already a fallen woman in society’s eyes. Her family fortune and estate are gone, she lost her young husband to suicide years earlier, and she is a social pariah due to her indiscrete sexual behavior. She also has a bad drinking problem, which she covers up poorly. Behind her veneer of social snobbery and sexual propriety, Blanche is an insecure, dislocated individual. She is an aging Southern belle who lives in a state of perpetual panic about her fading beauty. Her manner is dainty and frail, and she sports a wardrobe of showy but cheap evening clothes. Stanley quickly sees through Blanche’s act and seeks out information about her past. The notion of death is apparent through Blanches maiden name, Grey, which suggests bleakness and unhappiness. Indeed we are introduced to the fact that behind…
Dubois shows a mixed array of actions that confuses the audience into whether she is to be sympathized or not. At the beginning of the play, the author Tennessee Williams shows us the arrogant and demanding side of Blanche, provoking the audience to dislike her, but as the play goes on, Williams gradually reveals more about Blanche’s troublesome past, making the audience sympathize her more. Blanche arrives at the Kowalski household— Elysian Fields, dressed fancily. “She is daintily dressed in a white suit with a fluffy bodice, necklace and ear-rings of pearl, white gloves and hat, looking as if she were arriving at a summer tea or cocktail party in the garden district.”…
The excerpt primarily focuses on evolving the motif of light, which Blanche has a strong aversion too and which symbolizes multiple aspects of her shady past, and also characterizes her gradually declining mental state, consequentially leading to complete insanity. Again, William’s employs the motif of light in the play and this is evident through Blanche’s constant dislike of light. The characterization of her insanity is illustrated by various aspects including her troubled past and nervous nature. The passage employs both the light motif and characterization of insanity to further develop the plays themes and effectively add to the dynamics of the characters and play. Light is present in everyday life. It brightens the dark and may even serve as a beacon of hope. However, for some it is a scorching spotlight directed towards the soul, forcing individuals to shun away and hide in their dark secrets and pasts just as Blanche DuBois did. This aversion of light may be experienced by anybody, hiding from the reality of truth. Furthermore, insanity unfortunately, is present amongst people and society. Many are either born handicapped but others may mentally devolve and become psychologically unstable because of harsh or traumatic pasts, influencing their later actions, such as the case with Blanche. Not only was the motif of light and characterization of insanity illustrated in the passage, but also relate to life. The strong potency of the functions of this cited passage from A Streetcar Named Desire, transform the play into a relatable and dynamic…
The play A Streetcar Named Desire revolves around Blanche DuBois; therefore, the main theme of the drama concerns her directly. In Blanche is seen the tragedy of an individual caught between two worlds-the world of the past and the world of the present-unwilling to let go of the past and unable, because of her character, to come to any sort of terms with the present. The final result is her destruction. This process began long before her clash with Stanley Kowalski. It started with the death of her young husband, a weak and perverted boy who committed suicide when she taunted him with her disgust at the discovery of his perversion. In retrospect, she knows that he was the only man she had ever loved, and from this early catastrophe evolves her promiscuity. She is lonely and frightened, and she attempts to fight this condition with sex. Desire fills the emptiness when there is no love and desire blocks the inexorable movement of death, which has already wasted and decayed Blanche's ancestral home Belle Reve.…
However, the challenges of authority in both Blanche and Stanley develop into the conflict and throughout the play determines who the “winner” is. Stanley although throughout the play loses his authority in some moments of the play; he is physically violent, intimidating, and most importantly economical dominant. Whereas Blanche goes against social order and victimized by Stanley through rape which raises the conflict of sociopolitical…
To begin with, I will focus on Blanche Dubois and her secrets, illusions, and gender roles in “A Streetcar Named Desire”. Blanche DuBois seems within the first scene wearing white, the image of purity and innocence. She is visible as a moth-like creature. She is delicate, delicate, and touchy. She is cultured and smart. She could in no way willingly hurt a person. She doesn't want realism; she prefers magic. She doesn't always inform the truth, but she tells "what must be truth." Yet she has lived a lifestyle that would make the most degenerate character seem timid. She is, in popular, one among Williams' characters who do not belong on this…