Will Gropper
The Glass Menagerie Essay
In everybody’s life, there comes a time where one must make a life changing decision. Hindsight is 20-20, and sometimes regrets are had about your decision. In The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, Tom faces the choice of whether to stay and provide for his family, or leave to pursue his own interests. This leads to much emotional turbulence and deliberation throughout the play. Tom’s struggle of whether to leave or not and his reflections upon remembering his decision makes him the most tragic and main character in the play. Tom’s desires to leave are already surfacing in the first few scenes of the play. Throughout scene one, we see Tom and Amanda, his mother, bickering at dinner like an
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He shows he just can’t handle being supervised and guided on everything like a toddler. This is evidenced when Amanda begins taking Tom’s books “ Look! I've got nothing in this house… I can call my own!... Yesterday you confiscated my books! You had the nerve to-.” If Amanda could not appreciate the greatness of an established author, his interests would never be understood or appreciated. Finally, when Tom tries to make his mother see that he is a different human being than her, that he is not an exact reproduction of her values and opinions, Amanda pushes it away. He argues that "man is by instinct a lover, a hunter, and a fighter”(34). These are qualities which Amanda's husband possessed and she refused to recognize these qualities as decent. Therefore, Tom knew his only chance to be happy was to copy his father by leaving home. Tom acted with painful honesty by committing himself to a life that excluded the shoe warehouse, the audiences in movie houses, and a direct and everlasting contact with his family. Tom was aware of the inner struggle within himself, and knew that he had to act quickly or his true personality would be buried forever under the weight of his dull life. He realized that his own creative abilities and his sensitivity were being destroyed by his surroundings. Furthermore, he knew that if he didn't make a big change, he would regret it and be terribly unhappy. He would never love
Thus showing how he is trying to lead his own life instead of letting others decide and growing up and becoming more mature in the process. Tom continues to show his maturity when Phillip is leaving. He does not cry or try to get his way, but instead accepts life as it is and goes along with it. He says, “I wanted to rebel against what was happening, against the clumsiness and crudity of life, but instead I stood quiet a moment, almost passive…” (Ross 234).
Tom is a young man bearing the responsibility of his handicapped sister, Laura, and his suffocating mother, Amanda. He works in a factory, and uses his paycheck to provide for the family. Jim, a fellow factory worker and former high school friend, knows Tom as Shakespeare, in that Tom writes poetry, sometimes to alleviate his suppressed feelings of frustration. Poetry is one of Tom’s methods of escape from the lunacy in his home. Adventure is something Tom does not experience much of, and is angst toward his less than mediocre life is expressed in many of his arguments with Amanda.
We already know that Tom and Daisy's marriage is troubled and it mainly is due to the fact that he has a woman in New York and Daisy has knowledge about this and might be disturbed about Tom's infidelity. This is an important aspect about their conflict.
Tom can now start to show his maturity everywhere, including at home. In the beginning, Tom is running from Aunt Polly's punishments, hurries through chores, and plays hooky from school. When he convinces kids to do his job of whitewash the fence for him, it shows immaturity. Also when he runs away from home to the island, he doesn't leave a note.
Later, Amanda once again harrasses Tom for jeopardizing his job and the family’s security, all to go to the movies and drink liquor. Foreshadowing his own leaving, Tom angrily gestures to his father’s picture on the wall saying to his mother, “you say self [myself], self’s all I ever think of. Why, listen, if self [myself] is what I thought of, Mother, I'd be where he is - GONE!” (3. Tom) To elaborate, Tom is saying that if he was truly as selfish as his mother describes, he would have left long ago, just like his father. Throughout The Glass Menagerie, Tom remains hateful to his mother, and even names her a witch during one of their arguments. It is safe to say that Amanda is the one person that really drives Tom
In The Glass Menagerie, by Tennessee Williams, the glass menagerie is a clear and powerful metaphor for each of the four characters, Tom, Laura, Amanda, and the Gentleman Caller. It represents their lives, personality, emotions, and other important characteristics.
Laura's mother and brother shared some of her fragile tendencies. Amanda, Laura's mother, continually lives in the past. Her reflection of her teenage years continually haunts Laura. To the point where she forces her to see a "Gentleman Caller" it is then that Tom reminds his mother not to "expect to much of Laura" she is unlike other girls. But Laura's mother has not allowed herself nor the rest of the family to see Laura as different from other girls. Amanda continually lives in the past when she was young a pretty and lived on the plantation. Laura must feel she can never live up to her mothers expectations. Her mother continually reminds her of her differences throughout the play.
As Winfield 's wife, Amanda is worthy of love and respect. Amanda is a southern lady, when she was young, she had an attractive appearance and graceful in manner, and her families were also quite rich. These favorable conditions made her the admiration of many men. Still, her final choice was a poor boy. She did not hesitate and bravely to choose her own love. Though her marriage was not as good as she had imagined the happiness of life, and the husband, Winfield meager income also drinking heavily, finally abandoned Amanda and two young children, but she still remembered and loved her husband. Her husband 's weakness did not make Amanda fall down; instead, she was brave enough to support the family, raising and educating of their two young children. Daughter Laura was a disability to close her fantasy world, and she was collection of a pile of glass small animals as partners. Amanda knew Laura sensitive, fragile, she was always in the care and encourages her daughter. Because of her shortcomings, Laura sometimes frustrated and Amanda immediately replied that "I 've told you never, never to use that word. Why, you 're not crippled, you just have a little defect". Amanda for the care of the children was more reflected a mother 's strong from the play that Amanda paid money to send Laura to typing school. She hoped daughter have a better future and married a good man to take care of the family, and encouraged her daughter, prompting her to go out of the glass menagerie to experience her real life, but Amanda placed more expectations for his son Tom because her husband left home, Tom is the only man and the mainstay of the family. She wanted Tom to realize that is a kind of family responsibility, also is a kind of essential social
The family dynamics for Tennessee Williams are evident of a lifestyle of despondency and tension within the household. Tennessee Williams mother Edwina Williams she considered herself a Southern Belle, and his sister Rose Williams was a sickly adolescent whom he shared his imaginative dramatizations with as he transcribed his plays. While Williams was in graduate school at the University of Iowa, Rose was institutionalized for schizophrenia and was underwent a pre-font lobotomy. “The symbolization of lobotomy in the “Glass Menagerie” play signifies the hurt that Tennessee Williams felt by his parents by not collaborating to him that his sister underwent surgery. In the play, Williams substitutes the mental illness of his real sister, with a physical limitation “a limp” which Williams substituted for the mental illness of his real sister, Rose. Even the father’s absence reflects periods when his bullying sales man father, Cornelius Coffin Williams, would go on the road, leaving Tom, Edwina and Rose at one another’s mercies (Charles Matthews, 1996-2016).”
Because of him working in the warehouse and having to put his dreams on hold, it seems to make him bitter and rude to his mother. His mother puts a lot of pressure on him with working and making the money to pay the bills. Also his mother is always getting mad when he goes out. In the play Tom snaps at his mother one night after she’s nags him about going out, some of the stuff he said wasn’t necessary, but we all say things we don’t mean when we are upset. His mother does work by trying to sell magazines, but during this time period the Great Depression was going on so it was hard on everyone with money.
The Glass Menagerie is an eposidic play written by Tennesse Williams reflecting the economic status and desperation of the American people in the 30s.He portrays three different characters going through these hardships of the real world,and choosing different ways to escape it.Amanada,the mother,escapes to the memories of the youth;Tom watches the movies to provide him with the adventure he lacks in his life;and laura runs to her glass menagerie.
At this point, Tom becomes a more selfish character. There is less sympathy given in his direction. In fact, this is probably where we feel a little more sorry for Amanda. Amanda has probably not done everything right for her family, but her intentions have always been good. Tom has lost patience and wants to pursue his journey away now.
The three family members are adults at the time of this play, struggling to be individuals, and yet, very enmeshed and codependent with one another. The overbearing and domineering mother, Amanda, spends much of her time reliving the past; her days as a southern belle. She desperately hopes her daughter, Laura, will marry. Laura suffers from an inferiority complex partially due to a minor disability that she perceives as a major one. She has difficulty coping with life outside of the apartment, her cherished glass animal collection, and her Victrola. Tom, Amanda's son, resents his role as provider for the family, yearns to be free from him mother's constant nagging, and longs to pursue his own dreams. A futile attempt is made to match Laura with Jim, an old high school acquaintance and one of Tom's work mates.
Tom is more of a realist compared to Amanda’s hopeful view on life. He knows life will never measure up to his mother’s expectations. The world has changed and he feels his mother needs to wake up. His personality is a direct contrast to Amanda.
In The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, the theme of abandonment is salient to the play. Throughout most of the play, Tom contemplates whether he should stay with his family doing something he hates or leave them and follow his dream. His yen to be happy controls his decision in the end. Through Tom's actions, thoughts, and the negative imagery of his father, Williams proves that abandonment is a viable solution in the escaping challenges and reality, if it is tenable.