Who Is Responsible For Blanche's Downfall

This play tells the feverish story of the pathetic mental and emotional demise of a determined, however fragile, repressed and delicate Southern lady (Blanche Dubois) born to a once-wealthy family. Her impoverished, tragic downfall in the squalid, ..
Huntleigh for help escaping from New Orleans; when Stella laughs at her,Blanche reveals that she is completely broke. Stanley walks in as Blanche ismaking fun of him and secretly overhears Blanche and Stella’s conversation.Later, he threatens Blanche with hints that he has heard rumors of herdisreputable past. She is visibly dismayed.While Blanche is alone in theapartment one evening, waiting for Mitch to pick her up for a date, a teenageboy comes by to collect money for the newspaper. Blanche
doesn’t have anymoney for him, but she hits on him and gives him a lustful kiss. Soon afterthe boy departs, Mitch arrives, and they go on their date. When Blanchereturns, she is exhausted and clearly has been uneasy for the entire nightabout the rumors Stanley mentioned earlier. In a surprisingly sincere heart-to-heart discussion with Mitch, Blanche reveals the greatest tragedy of her past. Years ago, her young husband committed suicide after she discovered andchastised him for his homosexuality. Mitch describes his own loss of a formerlove, and he tells Blanche that they need each other.When the next scenebegins, about one month has passed. It is the afternoon of Blanche’s birthday.Stella is preparing a dinner for Blanche, Mitch, Stanley, and herself, whenStanley comes in to tell her that he has learned news of Blanche’s sordidpast. He says that after losing the DuBois mansion, Blanche moved into afleabag motel from which she was eventually evicted because of hernumerous sexual liaisons.
Also, she was fired from her job as a schoolteacherbecause the principal discovered that she was having an affair with a teenagestudent. Stella is horrified to learn that Stanley has told Mitch these storiesabout Blanche. The birthday dinner comes and goes, but Mitch never arrives. Stanleyindicates to Blanche that he is aware of her past. For a birthday present, hegives her a one-way bus ticket back to Laurel. Stanley’s cruelty so disturbsStella that it appears the Kowalski household is about to break up, but theonset of Stella’s labor prevents the imminent fight.Several hours later,Blanche, drunk, sits alone in the apartment. Mitch, also drunk, arrives andrepeats all he’s learned from Stanley. Eventually Blanche confesses that thestories are true, but she also reveals the need for human affection she feltafter her husband’s death. Mitch tells Blanche that he can never marry her,saying she isn’t fit to live in the same house as his mother. Having learnedthat Blanche is not the chaste lady she pretended to be, Mitch tries to havesex with Blanche, but she forces him to leave by yelling “Fire!” to attract theattention of passersby outside. Later, Stanley returns from the hospital to findBlanche even more drunk. She tells him
that she will soon be leaving NewOrleans with her former suitor Shep Huntleigh, who is now a millionaire.Stanley knows that Blanche’s story is entirely in her imagination, but he is sohappy about his baby that he proposes they each celebrate their good fortune. Blanche spurns Stanley, and things grow contentious. When she triesto step past him, he refuses to move out of her way. Blanche becomesterrified to the point that she smashes a bottle on the table and threatens tosmash Stanley in the face. Stanley grabs her arm and says that it’s time forthe “date” they’ve had set up since Blanche’s arrival. Blanche resists, butStanley uses his physical strength to overcome her, and he carries her to bed. The pulsing music indicates that Stanley rapes Blanche.The next scene takesplace weeks later, as Stella and her neighbor Eunice pack Blanche’s bags.Blanche is in the bath, and Stanley plays poker with his buddies in the frontroom. A doctor will arrive soon to take Blanche to an insane asylum, butBlanche believes she is leaving to join her millionaire. Stella confesses toEunice that she simply cannot allow herself to believe Blanche’s assertionthat Stanley raped her. When Blanche emerges from the bathroom, herdeluded talk makes it clear that she has lost her grip on reality.The doctorarrives with a nurse, and Blanche initially panics and struggles against themwhen they try to take her away. Stanley and his friends fight to subdueBlanche, while Eunice holds Stella back to keep her from interfering. Mitchbegins to cry. Finally, the doctor approaches Blanche in a gentle manner andconvinces her to leave with him. She allows him to lead her away and doesnot look back or say goodbye as she goes. Stella sobs with her child in herarms, and Stanley comforts her with loving words and caresses.Analysis of Major Characters
Blanche DuBois
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 tosuicide years earlier, and she is a social pariah due to her indiscrete sexualbehavior. She also has a bad drinking problem, which she covers up poorly.Behind her veneer of social snobbery and sexual propriety, Blanche is aninsecure, dislocated individual. She is an aging Southern belle who lives in astate of perpetual panic about her fading beauty. Her manner is dainty andfrail, and she sports a wardrobe of showy but cheap evening clothes. Stanleyquickly sees through Blanche’s act and seeks out information about herpast.In the Kowalski household, Blanche pretends to be a woman who hasnever known indignity. Her false propriety is not simply snobbery, however; itconstitutes a calculated attempt to make herself appear attractive to newmale suitors. Blanche depends on male sexual admiration for her sense of self-esteem, which means that she has often succumbed to passion. Bymarrying, Blanche hopes to escape poverty and the bad reputation that haunts her. But because the chivalric Southern gentleman savior andcaretaker (represented by Shep Huntleigh) she hopes will rescue her isextinct, Blanche is left with no realistic possibility of future happiness. AsBlanche sees it, Mitch is her only chance for contentment, even though he isfar from her ideal.Stanley’s relentless persecution of Blanche foils her pursuitof Mitch as well as her attempts to shield herself from the harsh truth of hersituation. The play chronicles the subsequent crumbling of Blanche’s self-image and sanity. Stanley himself takes the final stabs at Blanche, destroyingthe remainder of her sexual and mental esteem by raping her and thencommitting her to an insane asylum. In the end, Blanche blindly allowsherself to be led away by a kind doctor, ignoring her sister’s cries. This finalimage is the sad culmination of Blanche’s vanity and total dependence uponmen for happiness.
Stanley Kowalski
Audience members may well see Stanley as an egalitarian hero at the play’sstart. He is loyal to his friends and passionate to his wife. Stanley possessesan animalistic physical vigor that is evident in his love of work, of fighting,and of sex. His family is from Poland, and several times he expresses hisoutrage at being called “Polack” and other derogatory names. When Blanchecalls him a “Polack,” he makes her look old-fashioned and ignorant byasserting that he was born in America, is an American, and can only be called“Polish.” Stanley represents the new, heterogeneous America to whichBlanche doesn’t belong, because she is a relic from a defunct social hierarchy.He sees himself as a social leveler, as he tells Stella in Scene Eight.Stanley’sintense hatred of Blanche is motivated in part by the aristocratic pastBlanche represents. He also (rightly) sees her as untrustworthy and does notappreciate the way she attempts to fool him and his friends into thinking sheis better than they are. Stanley’s animosity toward Blanche manifests itself inall of his actions toward her—his investigations of her past, his birthday gift toher, his sabotage of her relationship with Mitch.In the end, Stanley’s down-to-earth character proves harmfully crude and brutish. His chief amusementsare gambling, bowling, sex, and drinking, and he lacks ideals andimagination. His disturbing, degenerate nature, first hinted at when he beatshis wife, is fully evident after he rapes his sister-in-law. Stanley shows noremorse for his brutal actions. The play ends with an image of Stanley as theideal family man, comforting his wife as she holds their newborn child. Thewrongfulness of this representation, given what we have learned about him inthe play, ironically calls into question society’s decision to ostracize Blanche. verish story of the pathetic mental and emotional demise of a determined, however fragile, repressed and delicate Southern lady (Blanche Dubois) born to a once-wealthy family. Her impoverished, tragic downfall in the squalid,