1. Introduction
1.1. Thesis: Tennessee Williams utilizes Blanche Dubois as a character who caught herself between the world of the past and refuses to accept the reality of the present and, so, chooses to escape reality through fantasies and illusion which is what ultimately leads to her destruction. Tennessee Williams uses motifs such as music, sounds, shadows, bathing, and social class status to essentially illuminate the embodiment of choice and the power it has over the soul ; thus, he uses Blanche Dubois to portray how catastrophic choices create a chain reaction of doom and the misery that molded her essence of life.
2. First body
2.1. Topic Sentence: Belle Reve is the surviving symbol and motivation of a way of life and customs that Blanche Dubois clutches with a hasty persistence. She comprehends she is an anachronism to the new South, yet in spite of wanting to
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Quotation: “Sometimes-there’s God-so quickly!” (116).
5.3. Quotation: “Flores. Flores para los muertos...Corones para los muertos. Corones...” (147).
5.4. Quotation: “[He picks up her inert figure and carries her to the bed.]” (162).
5.5 Quotation: “[Lurid reflections appear on the walls in odd, sinuous shapes. The “Varsouviana” is filtered into a weird distortion, accompanied by the cries and noises of the jungle. Blanche seizes the back of a chair as if to defend herself.]” (174).
6. Conclusion
6.1. Extended idea: Tennessee Williams uses Blanche Dubois as the epitome of a mentally unstable individual amidst the twentieth century and to emphasize how ill-minded individuals were shunned in society. He also illuminates how dangerous the decisions one makes are and the toll of chaos a choice can lead one into; in this case, the mental instability of Dubois was the outcome of immoral paths. Furthermore, Williams is a mirror image of the philosophical beliefs and emotional trauma that Dubois dealt with; revealing his own psychological
Color-blindness, the belief that a person’s race and/or skin tone does not matter. This is a philosophy of ignorance, found in the supposed ‘post-racial’ society of America. Touched upon in her essay, “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, Patricia Williams utilizes personal anecdotes, allusions, the double standard of race, and the personification of social issues to expose society’s attempts to brush racial problems under the proverbial rug. Throughout her social commentary, Williams targets the people who state “‘I don’t think about color, therefore your problems don’t exist’”
In Tennesse Williams play “A Streetcar Named Desire” he explores the idea of how an individual’s resilience is shaped by empathy. A person who is able to have empathy benefits from high self-esteem, reduced loneliness, and a strong sense of who they are, and in doing so become more resilient. Empathy assists resilience through developing strong supportive relationships. Williams’ shows the relationship between empathy and resilience through the character Blanche. Blanche struggles to empathize with others thus making her vulnerable and less resilient to change.
In contrast, Blanche, besides conducting her conversation subtly and indirectly, also enjoys refinement such as “art, poetry, and music” (83). She shields the lamp with paper lanterns and sprays the house with perfume, both refinements intolerable to Stanley, who tears them down at the last
The Modern Triumph of Napoleon If you take a scroll in Brooklyn Museum on a rainy afternoon, you will notice an intriguing piece called “Napoleon Leading the Army over the Alps” by Kehinde Wiley. There may be many reasons why this painting catches your eye. It could be the enormous size of the painting, the elaborate golden frame that stands out from other frameless contemporary art, or perhaps the excess of detail and sharp realism rather than the abstractness that is common in other pieces of the gallery. A second glimpse of the piece will bring about the feeling that you’ve seen this piece somewhere else before, in fact.
In The Gathering of Old Men, by Ernest J. Gaines, and The Bluest Eye, by Toni Morrison, the authors follow the story of different black communities and how they are affected by oppression. In The Gathering of Old Men a white man, Beau, is found dead in a black man’s yard, Mathu. Mathu’s ‘daughter’ brings together all of the black men in the surrounding neighborhoods to say that they were the ones who shot Beau. In The Bluest Eye a black child, Pecola, is oppressed in many ways throughout the story and near the end is raped by her father. The most substantial part of the story however, is afterwards and how she eventually becomes insane from the onslaught of oppression she faced.
Throughout Tennessee William’s ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ and Sylvia Plath’s ‘The Bell Jar’ feminine ideals of appearance are associates with ablutions and bathing. This is due to the view of water having renewing properties, the mental health associations of bathing within both texts, and the patriarchal view of feminine appearances. In William’s and Plath’s literary works, water is depicted as having renewal properties in the central feminine characters of both plots. In the character of Blanche DuBois this is most notable when she exclaims, “Oh, I feel so goof after my long, hot bath, I feel so good and cool and – rested!”. Blanche’s frequent baths, along with the excessive amount of time spent in the bathroom within the play, exemplify her attempts at purifying herself from the events of past and present.
In A Streetcar Named Desire, the author Tennessee Williams exaggerates and dramatizes fantasy’s incapability to overcome reality through an observation of the boundary between Blanches exterior and interior conveying the theme that illusion and fantasy are often better than reality. Blanche, who hides her version of the past, alters her present and her relationship with her suitor Mitch and her sister, Stella. Blanche was surrounded by death in her past, her relatives and husband have passed away, leaving her with no legacy left to continue. The money has exhausted; the values are falling apart and she is alienated and unable to survive in the harsh reality of modern society. Throughout the novel Williams juxtaposed Blanche’s delusions with
“A Streetcar Named Desire” contains a strong lighting motif that repeats throughout the play. This usually involves Blanche, a character who shies away from any light that is drawn upon her, and is especially sensitive to light when her suitor Mitch is around. To Blanche, she is still young and beautiful in her mind, but when light shines on her she becomes afraid that Mitch will notice her aging skin, her beauty falling. This motif heavily implies how Blanche sees herself and the significance to her sexual innocence. To begin, throughout the play the audience begins to understand how Blanche sees herself.
“The Great Gatsby” and “A Streetcar Named Desire” both focus on the common theme of pursuing goals and living the American Dream. As well as leaving behind the past and “turn a new leaf”. The main characters in each story, Blanche and Gatsby, both have dreams of wealth and great living.
Not only has Tennesse Williams portrayed Stella and Blanche to be seen as delicate and dependent, our own society has created this image but this not only affects how individuals see themselves but affects relationships immensely. Tennessee Williams reinforces the stereotype in which women are often the victims of unfortunate fate within the usage of the character Blanche. Throughout the whole play, we have witnessed Blanche being on the bitter end of life's miseries as she has encountered the tough loss of Belle Reve, dealing with her ex-husband's suicide and the loss of her relationship with Mitch. Arguably, the expectations and beliefs of women were either to be a housewife or a mother, whereas Blanche shows neither, as a result of automatically feeling out of place possibly leading to her downfall. Blanche was constantly fantasizing about the traditional values of a southern gentlemen, proving her dependence on this sex.
Blanche flees a failed company and a failed marriage in attempt to find refuge in her sister’s home. Through her whirlwind of emotions, the reader can see Blanche desires youth and beauty above all else, or so the readers think. In reality, she uses darkness to hide the true story of her past. In A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams, Williams uses the motif of light to reveal Blanche’s habit of living in a fantasy world until the light illuminates her reality. Blanche uses darkness to block her past from onlookers as to shape her image.
“A Streetcar Named Desire” is a very elegant film in which the Southern gothic culture is demonstrated profoundly. Tennessee Williams uses the characters in the play to bring about a sense of how corrupt society truly was in the 1940’s in the South. The 1940’s was marked by an immense amount of violence, alcoholism, and poverty. Women at the time were treated as objects rather than people. Throughout the play Tennessee Williams relates the aspects of Southern society to the characters in the play.
Blanche and Stella grew up on a plantation called Belle Reve, representing the Old South. The Old South had a sense of romanticism, focusing mainly on appearances. Blanche is a genuine Southern Belle. Throughout the play, Blanche makes it a point to look her best at all times. Stanley exasperatedly says, “What’s this here?
“[She springs up and crosses to it, and removes a whiskey bottle. She pours a half tumbler of whiskey and tosses it down. She carefully replaces the bottle and washes out the tumbler at the sink]”(1.71) Blanche tries to separate herself from reality when she drinks, trying to forget and escape her troubled past. Being in a new environment is unsettling.
A streetcar named desire was written by Tennessee Williams in 1947, in purpose to show the “declining of the upper class and the domination of the bourgeois middle class in the U.S.A. where the south agriculture class could not compete with the industrialization.” Blanche Dubois the protagonist of our story, a southern beauty that is trapped by the restrictive laws of her society. But she broke them, and eventually put herself in a state, where she had no job and no house. So she had to go to her sister, Stella and live with her and her sister’s husband, Stanley. While staying there, she created a façade for her to hide her flaws and kept acting as a lady, where she is anything but that.