Essay On Blanche Dubois As A Tragedy In A Streetcar Named Desire

In the 1945 Tennessee Williams play, the character of Blanche Dubois is by far the most complex persona. To explore whether the play can be regarded as her tragedy, where the play is regarded as a modern tragedy, we first need to examine the necessary criteria of the genre. To fulfil the standard, the play should be a serious representation of the downfall of the protagonist, a person of admirable qualities, who makes a fatal error. These qualities are wasted in the final calamity, which has a disproportion in scale between the initial error, and the size of the punishment. The catharsis should arouse feelings of pity and terror.

A Streetcar Named Desire can be seen as a modern domestic tragedy, with base elements of traditional tragedy. The central character, or protagonist, Blanche Dubois has the tragic flaw of hubris – with both pride of intellect and pride of sexual prowess.

Blanche has come to the home of her sister and brother in law Stella and Stanley Kowalski, because she has nowhere else to go, having lost the inheritance of their ancestral home, Belle Reve (Beautiful Dream), due to the mismanagement of hers and Stella s forbears. Stanley is an American of Polish extraction, a modern, rough, working class man who distrusts and dislikes Blanche from the outset. The admirable qualities Blanche displays of eloquence and education (Blanche is a teacher of literature) are to him an affectation and an annoyance. Blanche also tells of her admirable qualities herself, in scene ten, saying that she is cultivated, and of intelligence and breeding . Stella also points out more of them whilst talking to Stanley, telling him that Blanche as a child, was both tender and trusting. Blanche also dresses well, and is astonished at the st...

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...nche in a way that he has been unable to throughout the play so far, and by doing this, he is also cancelling out her aristocratic upbringing.

Finally, we see the punishment. When Blanche returns from hospital some days later and Blanche tells Stella what has happened, she chooses to disbelieve Blanche. As Stella says to her neighbour Eunice, “I couldn't believe her story and go on living with Stanley”. They arrange for Blanche to be committed to a mental institution. At the end of this final scene, whilst Stanley and his friends are playing poker, we see Blanche becoming hysterical as a nurse arrives and attempts to take her away. She only relents and becomes passive when the doctor enters the apartment, behaving like a gentleman. She then allows herself to be led away, quite calmly. I believe this symbolises the death of Blanche, the final, overwhelming punishment.