Misguided Feminist Reaction to A Streetcar Named Desire
The dramatic climax of A Streetcar Named Desire, clearly illustrates the mastery of author Tennessee Williams. The brilliantly constructed text, with its tragic story and enticing characters, propels the reader to a point in which he becomes emotionally involved in the dynamics of Williams’ world. Unfortunately, many feminists are negatively affected by Williams’ captivating writing style. In turn, feminists have developed an array of very strong opinions regarding the climax, often responding with a very personal and emotive discussion of the issues.
Concentrating on the dynamics of each character and his stance during the climax, feminists present an intelligent discussion on the inevitability of the rape and its effect on the characters. Unfortunately, many feminists have a tendency to become focused on the morals of rape, rather than exploring the symbolic nature of rape. Many feminists have also let their emotions and personal values sway their arguments, even to the point where they personally attack Tennessee Williams. However, a correct reading of the climax should focus on the symbolism of the event and the positioning of characters. From this stance, it becomes much clearer why this disturbing climax was essential, especially when considering the shocking conclusion to the play.
The feminist’s lack of serious discussion of the necessity of the rape scene is the weak link in their argument. While feminists concede that the character of Blanche is a woman with more than a few “inconsistencies”, their description of Stanley as a "monster" is not justified. Feminists neglect to consider Stanley’s vulnerability as a factor in the rape; but they justify...
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... and the rape are archetypes of society, representing the battle between good will and survival, good and evil, class and inhumanity, behind which the driving force is utter desire!
Works Cited and Consulted
Brownmiller, Susan. Against Our Will. New York: Bantam Books, 1975.
Dworkin, Andrea. Intercourse. New York: The Free Press, 1087
Lant, Kathleen Margaret. "A Streetcar Named Misogyny." pp. 225-238 in REDMOND.
Redmond, James (Editor). Violence in Drama. Cambridge University Press; 1991.
Spoto, Donald. The Kindness of Strangers. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1985.
Williams, Edwina Dakin. Remember Me to Tom. St. Louis: Sunrise Publishing Company, 1963.
Williams, Tennessee. Memoirs. New York: Doubleday and Company, Inc: 1975.
Williams, Tennessee. A Streetcar Named Desire. New York: Signet. Original copyright 1947.
Tennessee Williams was one of the most important playwrights in the American literature. He is famous for works such as “The Glass Menagerie” (1944), “A Streetcar Named Desire” (1947) or “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955)”. As John S. Bak claims: “Streetcar remains the most intriguing and the most frequently analyzed of Williams’ plays.” In the lines that follow I am going to analyze how the identity of Blanche DuBois, the female character of his play, “A Streetcar Named Desire”, is shaped.
Many different depictions of gender roles exist in all times throughout the history of American culture and society. Some are well received and some are not. When pitted against each other for all intents and purposes of opposition, the portrayal of the aspects and common traits of masculinity and femininity are separated in a normal manner. However, when one gender expects the other to do its part and they are not satisfied with the results and demand more, things can shift from normal to extreme fairly quickly. This demand is more commonly attributed by the men within literary works. Examples of this can be seen in Tennessee Williams' “A Streetcar Named Desire”, where Stella is constantly being pushed around and being abused by her drunken husband Stanley, and also in Charlotte Perkins Gilman's “The Yellow Wallpaper”, where the female narrator is claimed unfit by her husband as she suffers from a sort of depression, and is generally looked down on for other reasons.
In this paper it will be shown that the functionalists are correct. Functionalists argue that Blanche's self-concept, which she believes is a traditional upper class woman, eventually leads to her mental and emotional breakdown. Feminists argue Blanche is sent off to a mental hospital to hush up Stanley's crime of rape, not because of any illness. Although there is some value to the feminist interpretation, it contains several weaknesses. The following review of some aspects of the plot will reveal some of those weaknesses.
Her first problem is with the heroine of the play, Blanche DuBois, who, she claims, is "ironically made guilty for her own victimization. No longer fully human, she is simply a metaphor of all that is vile about women. Blanche cannot, then, claim tragic stature or even our sympathy precisely because she is a victim of rape. And as she becomes responsible for her own victimization, Stanley is left to glory in his ascendancy. This aspect of Streetcar arises from the misogyny which colors the play…" (Lant 226). Admittedly, Blanche does flirt with Stanley briefly at the beginning of the play—just as many women playfully flirt with their brothers-in-law. But as her relationship with Stanley deteriorates, she makes it quite obvious to him that she loathes the sight of him. Though the world in which Lant lives may be one in which a woman, playfully sprinkling her brother-in-law ...
be shaped at a very early age. A beggar was chosen to be his godfather
Within Tennessee Williams's story about love and abuse within marriage and challenging familial ties, there lie three very different characters that all see the world in vastly different ways. These members of a family that operate completely outside of our generation’s norms, are constantly unsure of themselves and their station within the binary not only of their familial unit, but within the gender binary that is established for them to follow. Throughout the story of the strange family, each character goes through a different arch that changes them irrevocably whether it is able to be perceived or not by those around them. The only male, Stanley is initially the macho force in the home who controls everything without question. He has no consequences for his actions against his wife and is never held accountable for treating the people around him poorly; this lasts until Blanche arrives. Blanche is an outwardly demure, but spirited young woman who after experiencing untold misfortune breaks mentally and decides to no longer care what others may think of her. She lives her life lavishly and foolishly by having dalliances with younger or richer men who shower her with gifts and attention to get sex from her all too willing form. Her effect on Stanley is one of temptation and challenge; she continually tries to convince her sister that she is too good for the man and in turn fosters a resentment for her in him. Stella acts as the antithesis of Stanley and Blanche’s extreme personalities. She is innocence and purity where they are the darkness that threatens to overtake her life. Throughout, Stella is a pawn that they both try to use against the other to no real avail as she is determined to make the best choice for herself. In th...
Charles Goodyear was born in New Haven, Connecticut on December 29, 1800 to Amasa and Cynthia Goodyear. Charles’s father was a hardware manufacture and a merchant. Amasa Goodyear built mainly farming tools like hayforks and scythes, which he invented. When Charles was a teenager he wanted to go into the ministry and become a pastor, but his father convinced him that he was a good business man and placed him in the hardware store of the Rogers brothers in Philadelphia at the age of seventeen. He worked there until he was twenty-one years old. At that time he returned to New Haven to join his father’s business, making farm tools. For five years he worked for his father, building up the family business. On August 24, 1824, while he was still working for his father he married Clarissa Beecher who also lived in New Haven, Connecticut. In 1826 Charles Goodyear decided to move to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. There he opened a hardware store where he sold the products that his father made. Four years after opening this store both Amasa and Charles Goodyear were bankrupt because they would extend credit to customers and the customers would never pay back the money that they owed. Charles’s health started to decline and both father and son owed tens of thousands of dollars. For the next thirty years Charles Goodyear was thrown in prison over ten times because he didn’t pay his debts. In 1834 when he was in New York, on a business trip, the Roxbury India Rubber Company caught his eye. ...
Stanley’s treatment of Blanche leaves her alone once again, with what little dreams of returning to her previous status destroyed like the paper lampshade that once gave her the shield from the real her she desperately craved. Stella, the one person Blanche believed she could rely on, sides against her husband after Blanche’s ordeal, leading Blanche to be taken away, relying on the “kindness of strangers”. This final image that Williams leaves us with fully demonstrates that Blanche has been cruelly and finally forced away from her “chosen image of what and who” she is, leaving an empty woman, once full of hope for her future.
In “A Street Car Named Desire”, Williams depicts a realistic atmosphere that many readers would be familiar or relate with. He wrote this play under the assumptions that due to an illness it may be his last. “He set out to explore the far recesses of his mind to establish his main philosophy of life, "The apes shall inherit the earth." Williams was a very sickly and sensitive person in his youth and very easily subjected to the harshness and cruelty of others” (Marotous 2006). Williams filled his two main characters, Stanley and Blanche, with different attitudes toward sex, love, and opposing social status, allowing a power struggle to arise between them. The play at first look may appear to surely end on a happy note but after review it is clearly a tragedy.
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