Harsh Issues in A Streetcar Named Desire
A Streetcar Named Desire, by Tennessee Williams, is a play which deals
with many harsh issues like spousal abuse, rape, and insanity. The play
is mainly about Blanche and her sister Stella. Blanche arrives at her
sisterÕs house after being fired from the school where she taught and
after loosing the big family house. She says she is on a leave of
absence, but Stella and her husband, Stanley, soon find out the truth.
Throughout the play Blanche acts as someone she isnÕt, in order to hide
her past and hope that someone will desire her. Her escape is futile for
her past is uncovered, and her last chance to meet a man is
destroyed.The main theme of this play is the uselessness of escape.
Blanche arrives at her sistersÕ house acting like someone she isnÕt. Her
dirty past, and her motives for puting on this act are quickly
discovered and Blanche ends up in a nut house.
When Blanche arrives at her sistersÕ home she says that she has come to
stay with them temporarily because she has lost the family estate (she
could no longer support it financially). Blanche has an air of
superiority, indirectly commenting on where her sister lives and acting
as if she has more class. When Stanley meets Blanche he is quickly
suspicious of how she obtained all of her clothes, furs and jewelry. In
the third scene Stanley is drunk after a poker night and hits his wife.
They reconciliate the same night and Blanche puts on an act of how
terrified she is, even after being reassured by two people the event
wasnÕt a big deal. In scene four Blanche tells her sister about one of
her rich friends that could send her some money and get her out of her
bind. This is a lie, later on Stanley finds out that this man is not
rich, and just an old aquantance of Blanche. Later on Blanche has a
converstaion with Stella, which Stanley over hears, where she speaks of
Stanley calling him primitive and saying he has animal like behaviors.
This turns Stanley against Stella, even though he says nothing to her
face. Blanche meets Mitch one of StanleysÕ friends, and one day she
explains to her sister that she wants to decieve Mitch so that he wants
Resiliency is one concept that has never been the human races forte. Many things that happen in our current day and age require a great deal of perseverance and resiliency. People often will give in to the problems in their lives and learn to accept them, instead of persevering through them and working out the issues. The fact of the matter is, if you learn to persevere through problems, your life will be a lot more happy and pleasant to live. In Tennessee Williams’ play, “ A Streetcar Named Desire” suggests that you cannot give up on issues; you must be resilient to those issues and persevere to be happy.
How do Blanche Dubois’s interactions with males in A Streetcar Named Desire lead to her self-destruction?
In Tennessee Williams' play, A Streetcar Named Desire, Williams uses the suicide of Blanche's husband to illuminate Blanche's insecurities and immoral behavior. When something terrible happens to someone, it often reveals who he or she truly is. Blanche falls victim to this behavior, and she fails to face her demons. This displays how the play links a character’s illogical choices and their inner struggles.
Prior to NAFTA (Inc. April 2006), “… tariffs of thirty percent or higher on export goods to Mexico were common, as were long delays caused by paperwork…. NAFTA addressed this imbalance by phasing out tariffs over 15 years. Approximately 50 percent of the tariffs were abolished immediately when the agreement took effect, and the remaining tariffs were targeted for gradual elimination.” According to Kimberly Amadeo (2015), article 102 of the NAFTA agreement outlines its purposes which is to “Grant the signatories Most Favored Nation status, eliminate barriers to trade and facilitate the cross-border movement of goods and services, promote conditions of fair competition, increase investment opportunities, provide protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights, create procedures for the resolution of trade disputes, and establish a framework for further, trilateral, regional, and multilateral cooperation to expand the trade agreement’s benefits.”. This quotation, condenses the agreement by stating that the intentions of NAFTA which was an agreement created to ease trade on imports and exports, by eliminating tariff barriers, in order to encourage competition and venture opportunities. Although, free trade is supposed to bring wealth, strength, and prosperity it should also
He said “Pig-Polack-disgusting-vulgar-greasy…Remember what Heuy Long said-“Every Man is a King!” And I am the King around here, so don’t forget it! My place is cleared! You want me to clear your places?”(Williams131). This proves that Stanley has a violent and disrespectful character. He claims that he is the man of the house and no one else can take his place even temporarily. Every time his dominance is doubted by someone else he feels challenged and impulsive. Especially with women, he gives them no respect but expects their respect and shows a deep desire for control. This relates to the thesis because he talks and acts with women in a very violent way, which makes them emotionally hurt. This scene is also very ironic because Stanley states that he is not an animal and that he is a hundred percent perfect American but in reality he has an inhuman behavior and he is savage, which is portrayed in the way he talks, eats , and acts with
During the confrontation during the poker game, which immediately ends it, readers are exposed to the reality of Stella and Stanley’s
The free trade that NAFTA has established among the United States, Mexico, and Canada has...
told Allan "I saw, I know, you disgust me…"( p.96). To Allan, Blanche seemed to
Tennessee Williams has said, “We have to distrust each other. It is our only defense against betrayal.” Betrayal is prevalent in life and literature and creates uncertainty. According to Williams, without questioning people, one will eventually be betrayed. Characters deceive each other and, occasionally, themselves as they try to mend their lives. In A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams, betrayal is evident in every relationship — Blanche and Mitch, Blanche and Stella, and Blanche and Stanley — and contributes to the theme of uncertainty in the novel. Blanche Dubois is the ultimate example of betrayal because she ends up being betrayed and betraying others throughout the play, which serves as a basic model of the effects betrayal can have on a person.
In the drama “Hamlet” the character of Hamlet around which, the whole story revolves has been portrayed by Shakespeare through the constant internal conflicts that leads him towards the doomed end, hence in the drama the character of Hamlet exhibits how psyche governs the transitional behaviors that shapes up the ultimate fate in both positive or negative way.
To put you in the right frame of mind the, year is 1991. George H. W. Bush is president, Operation Desert Storm came and went, and prior to the signing of NAFTA, the only trade agreement resembling it in North America was the Canadian-United States Free Trade Agreement (CUSFTA). With CUSFTA coming into its junior year, President Bush was getting ready to launch another trade agreement involving the United States and Mexico. With talks already under way between President Bush and Mexican President Carlos Salinas De Gortari outlining the agreement. Canada was beginning to conjure up fears within its own administration that this new trade agreement between the United States and Mexico might cause CUSFTA to take a back seat. These fear-mongers main campaign point was that this agreement with Mexico would cause cheap Mexican labor to undercut the Canadian work force, slowing trade with Canada to a trickle. So, with this fear firmly griping Canadian political and economical big wigs, Canada requested to participate in what would become NAFTA in 1994.
The ideology of male dominance has existed since the beginning of mankind. In the play A Streetcar Named Desire, by Tennessee Williams, it is especially apparent that Stanley, who is a working class man, feels the need to assert and reassert this principle of power constantly. Williams makes clear, through the character of Stanley, that the yearning for others’ recognition of their power and capability is the motive behind men’s masculine inclinations.
Death in A Streetcar Named Desire Tennessee Williams uses the theme of death continually in the play ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ through the use of dramatic imagery and literal references. The characters of Blanche and Mitch are used the most frequently to express Williams’ own obsession with death. Though neither of the characters actually obsesses about death, Blanche’s life has been smothered by the deaths of those she loves and the coming death of Mitch’s mother is an obvious motivation for his actions. Blanche first voices the theme of death in the very first scene whilst discussing the fate that has befallen Belle Reve.
NAFTA was first created with a different illusion and an aspect of making the North American economy a beautiful place to be in. People would have the cheapest foods, electronics and cars because everything would be tax less and we would help each other manufacture it. Even though his sounds relevant it never became this way, everything in this agreement was stepped down and though twice about by the mexican people. American being as stubborn opens new maquiladoras and creates a rapid growth phenomenom near cities where theses sweat shops quickly open(McLymont, pg3). Canada never gets contemplated with this agreement, reason being is because it is closer to America and their system is also running on the buying and shipment of Mexican goods(Fanjul, Fraser,pg3).
“Illusions commend themselves to us because they save us pain and allow us to enjoy pleasure instead. We must therefore accept it without complaint when they sometimes collide with a bit of reality against which they are dashed to pieces” (Sigmund Freud). Illusion can be a part of our lives; however, if taken to the extreme, it can lead one to forget reality. Every individual has problems in life that must be faced with reality and not with illusion, even though it might throw one into flames of fires. Tennessee Williams' play of a family reveals the strength of resistance between reality and desire, judgment and imagination, and between male and female. The idea of reality versus illusion is demonstrated throughout the play. Blanche's world of delusion and fantastical philosophy is categorized by her playful relationships, attempts to revive her youth, and her unawareness in the direction of reality of life. In Tennessee William’s play, A Streetcar Named Desire, through the study of character and tropology, fantasy and illusion allow one to make life appear as it should be rather than as it is.