Tennessee Williams “A Streetcar Named Desire,” (Williams 1777), introduces a rich, colorful cast of characters and set in New Orleans in the late 1940s. The story revolves around several sets of relationships and subsequent confrontations with each other. The first is between sisters Blanche DuBois and Stella Kowalski, and the second, more prominent relationship showcased, is between Blanche and Stella’s husband Stanley Kowalski.
Stella’s life becomes quite interesting with the arrival of her sister Blanche DuBois. Stella loves her sister, but Blanche is quite a handful. The past events in Blanche’s life are not lost on Stella and she understands the role she must play with her sister. Blanche is blood family and Stella is determined
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His distrust of Blanche deepens and he believes with all his heart that he needs to expose her to Stella for what she is, a shame. Stella is not having any of it and counters every argument that Stanley states about his belief. Stanley simply cannot believe that anyone with furs and diamonds, albeit fake, could not have money. Stella is angry and in a rare act stands up to Stanley and states, “You have no idea how stupid and horrid you’re being! Now close that trunk before she comes out of the bathroom!” She goes on to say, “…I’m going outside. You come out with me while Blanche is getting dressed.” Stanley reacts suddenly and with venom, “Since when do you give me orders?” Stella’s strength wavers and she resorts back to peacekeeper. She asks Stanley, “Are you going to stay here and insult her?” to which he replies, “You’re damn tootin’ I’m going to stay here.” (1790). Stella understands when to stop talking when it comes to Stanley. Well, most of the time she …show more content…
She points out everything that is wrong with Stanley, but Stella holds fast to the notion that he isn’t normally like this. Stella clearly matches the sociological profile of a battered woman. She is essentially submissive, and tolerates her husband’s behavior. For every example Blanche states, Stella counters with an excuse. Blanche just does not understand Stella’s attitude towards Stanley’s behavior. Stella has accepted her working-class husband because she has renounced desire. Stanley and the apartment mean survival (Thomieres 378). Stella’s choice to remain with Stanley is alien to
With Streetcar, Stella Kowalski tries to gain some more with from her husband Stanley. After Blanche arrived Stella started defending herself more and telling Stanley what to do. For example, in the poker night scene, Stella says “Drunk- drunk-animal think, you! All of you- please go home! If any of you have one spark of decency in you-” (Williams
Tennessee Williams A Streetcar Named Desire is a overly dramatic play that concludes in a remarkable manner. The play takes off by introducing Stanley and Stella, a married couple whom live in New Orleans. They have a two-sided relationship, very loving but abusive. Then suddenly Blanche shows up, Stella’s sister, and informs Stella that their home in Belle Reve was lost. A few days later, Blanche meets and becomes attracted to Mitch, a friend of Stanley. Blanche sees Stanley as an abusive husband and contrasts him to Mitch. Blanche immediately begins to develop deep emotions for Mitch because he is very romantic and a gentleman. Blanche begins to talk to Stella because she does not want her sister to be abused.
Her character represents absolute indifference due to her largely domestic and submissive role. Stella is almost a prisoner in her own home; she is continuously indoors from the outset of the play. Her character is subjugated by the language in the play. She is rarely called by her name, and is continuously referred to as "honey", "baby", or "sweetie" instead. This is one of the characteristics of the feminine struggle for equality within contemporary society; her name is not used to confirm her identity - instead she is branded by condescending labels which overwhelm her individuality. Stella is often belittled physically through the violence her husband subjects her too; for example, Stanley 's response to her request for help to clearing the table:
Throughout Tennessee Williams’s play “A Streetcar Named Desire,” Blanche Dubois exemplified several tragic flaws. She suffered from her haunting past; her inability to overcome; her desire to be someone else; and from the cruel, animalistic treatment she received from Stanley. Sadly, her sister Stella also played a role in her downfall. All of these factors ultimately led to Blanche’s tragic breakdown in the end. Blanche could not accept her past and overcome it.
Soon after Blanche arrives to live with her sister in New Orleans, she comes up with the plan for her pregnant sister, Stella, and herself to
Tennessee Williams gives insight into three ordinary lives in his play, “A Streetcar Named Desire” which is set in the mid-1930’s in New Orleans. The main characters in the play are Blanche, Stanley, and Stella. All three of these characters suffer from personalities that differentiate each of them to great extremes. Because of these dramatic contrarieties in attitudes, there are mounting conflicts between the characters throughout the play. The principal conflict lies between Blanche and Stanley, due to their conflicting ideals of happiness and the way things “ought to be”.
Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire is a play wrought with intertwining conflicts between characters. A drama written in eleven scenes, the play takes place in New Orleans over a nine-month period. The atmosphere is noisy, with pianos playing in the distance from bars in town. It is a crowded area of the city, causing close relations with neighbors, and the whole town knowing your business. Their section of the split house consists of two rooms, a bathroom, and a porch. This small house is not fit for three people. The main characters of the story are Stella and Stanley Kowalski, the home owners, Blanche DuBois, Stella’s sister, Harold Mitchell (Mitch), Stanley’s friend, and Eunice and Steve Hubbell, the couple that lives upstairs. Blanche is the protagonist in the story because all of the conflicts involve her. She struggles with Stanley’s ideals and with shielding her past.
The drama is basically about a married couple -Stella and Stanley Kowalski- who are visited by Stella's older sister, Blanche. The drama shows the caustic feelings of these people putting Blance DuBois in the center. The drama tells the story of the pathetic mental and emotional demise of a determined, yet fragile, repressed and delicate Southern lady born to a once-wealthy family of Mississippi planters.3 No doubt that the character of Blanche is the most complex one in the drama. She is truly a tragic heroine.
In Tennessee Williams play "A Streetcar Named Desire" two of the main characters Stanley and Blanche persistently oppose each other, their differences eventually spiral into Stanley's rape of Stella.
She thinks that his house is not nice, which makes Stanley dislike her even more. Blanche thinks she can walk all over Stanley and call him names, she acts like he doesn't love his wife as much as he says he does, she drinks almost all of his alcohol and likes to lie about it, she likes to take up all the time in the bathroom, and she also tries to get Stella to leave him. When this happens, things change. Stanley suddenly becomes aggressive.
Set in the French Quarter of New Orleans during the restless years following World War Two, A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE is the story of Blanche DuBois, a fragile and neurotic woman on a desperate prowl for someplace in the world to call her own. After being exiled from her hometown of Laurel, Mississippi for seducing a seventeen-year-old boy at the school where she taught English, Blanche explains her unexpected appearance on Stanley and Stella's (Blanche's sister) doorstep as nervous exhaustion. This, she claims, is the result of a series of financial calamities which have recently claimed the family plantation, Belle Reve. Suspicious, Stanley points out that "under Louisiana's Napoleonic code what belongs to the wife belongs to the husband." Stanley, a sinewy and brutish man, is as territorial as a panther. He tells Blanche he doesn't like to be swindled and demands to see the bill of sale. This encounter defines Stanley and Blanche's relationship. They are opposing camps and Stella is caught in no-man's-land. But Stanley and Stella are deeply in love. Blanche's efforts to impose herself between them only enrages the animal inside Stanley. When Mitch -- a card-playing buddy of Stanley's -- arrives on the scene, Blanche begins to see a way out of her predicament. Mitch, himself alone in the world, reveres Blanche as a beautiful and refined woman. Yet, as rumors of Blanche's past in Laurel begin to catch up to her, her circumstances become unbearable.
He makes no motion to stop, runs up the stairs and explains to his wife what’s going on, similar to what would occur in an equal relationship. Instead, he continues down the street like a boy with no responsibilities. Stella yells, “Where are you going,” and then asks if she could come to watch, he agrees but doesn’t stop waiting for her. This scene demonstrates how Stella follows Stanley along, and serves him according to what he wishes to do and when he wants to do it. In scene three, Stanley is having his poker party (pg. 57).
Stella Kowalski’s character, parallels to Stanley’s and represents the ego in the play. herself from her hometown and start a life in this vigorous world made by Stanley. she stands for the ego who wants to create a balance between desires and ideas, between body and soul, heart and mind to have a normal life. Blanche is the only one who wants to warn her of what she does. Loving Blanche, she also dislikes her and at the same time fears her. She hopes Blanche marry Mitch for her sister’s sake and for herself too. Actually she wants to get rid of
Stella represents an important part in this drama by providing a contrast to how life can change people when they go down different paths. In Contrast to her sister, Stella is bound to love. Although she fell in love with a primitive, common man, she most definitely loves him. Stella desires only to make Stanley happy and live a beautiful life together. She wants to find peace between her sister and her husband yet instead she finds conflict afflicting her on both sides. Blanche uses her dilutions and tries to sway Stella away from Stanley yet Stella takes all these slanders and belittles them. Stella does this because she loves Stanley and since she is pregnant with his baby.
Blanche Dubois, a refined and delicate woman plagued by bad nerves, makes her first appearance in scene one of A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams. She unexpectedly arrives in New Orleans to visit her sister Stella Kowalski who ran away after their father’s death. Upon their reunion, Blanche is sharp-tongued and quick to state her shock over the unsavory status of the apartment in comparison to the luxurious plantation where the two sisters were raised. Though dissatisfied by the living conditions, Blanche quickly explains that she had been given leave of absence from her teaching position due to bad nerves and could not stand being left alone—her excuse to invite herself to stay with Stella for an undetermined period of time. It