Mental Breakdown or Real Event? During the play, “A Streetcar Named Desire,” the audience witnesses a series of events, that leads Blanche and Stanley down a path of destruction. Throughout the entire play, Blanche attempts to manipulate anyone she comes across. She is seen throughout the play as delicate and comes from a wealthy house hold. Stanley, on the other hand, is an abusive husband to his wife Stella, very rough around the edges, and comes from a poor background. Towards the ending scenes of the book, Stella goes to the hospital to have her baby. Stanley, returning home without her, starts talking to Blanche. Blanche, who has had a few drinks, starts telling lies to Stanley about a Mr. Shep who is coming there to take her away. During …show more content…
this time, Stanley exposes Blanche for her lies, and approaches her, who at the time was calling for help. As Stanley closes in on her, Blanche breaks the back end of a liquor bottle nearby. She threatens to use the shattered liquor bottle on him if he doesn’t back away. He grabs her by the arm, she goes limp, and he picks her up and lays her in bed. The scene fades out, bringing forth the question, did Stanley get with Blanche, or did she make the whole scenario up. To fully understand the question at hand, one must analyze Blanche and Stanley. Not only in a physical state, but also in a phycological state. First, to analyze Stanley in a physical and mental state.
Stanley is a Polish man, he grew up in working-class type house hold. He is crude, and a very rugged looking guy. He is married to Stella, Blanche’s sister, and knows what he wants. Stanley likes to be in charge and has a very explosive personality. He is an abuser of alcohol, and an abusive husband towards Stella. He works at a factory, is a big poker player who loves to be in to be in charge. An example of this would be when Stella tells the men to stop playing poker, and Stanley reacts with violence. In the play Stella states, “You lay your hands on me and I’ll…,” this indicates that Stanley’s behavior is rapidly changing from the ‘honeymoon stage’ to the ‘explosion stage’ very rapidly. The narrator elaborates the situation as it further escalates, stating, “…(- She backs out of sight. He advances and disappears. There is the sound of a blow, Stella cries out. Blanche screams and runs into the kitchen. The men rush forward and there is grappling and cursing. Something is overturned with a crash.).” This shows the daily tendencies of Stanley, and what he is capable …show more content…
of. Now, shifting over to Blanche, who is an alcoholic, and suffers from her past mistakes.
Her mental and physical state isn’t present for most of the play. This is due to the loss of her young husband and losing her family home, Belle Reave. Blanche is left helpless with only her sister to turn to for help, she is shocked by how and where her sister is living. As Stella and Blanche are catching up, Stanley comes home. This is where tensions begin between Blanche and Stanley. While Stella is out of the house running errands for her sister, Blanche flirts with Stanley. Stanley tells Blanche, “If I didn't know that you was my wife's sister I'd get ideas about you!” This statement by Stanley suggests that he would be willing to get with Blanche, even if Blanche is Stella’s sister. Later in the same scene, Blanche tells Stella, “I called him a little boy and laughed and flirted. Yes, I was flirting with your husband!” This raises the question further, if Blanche didn’t get with Stanley, did she also dream up this entire
scenario. Being able to analyze Blanche and Stanley in a physical and mental state, helps the audience decide if Blanche truly did get with Stanley, or if she made the whole thing up. I believe Stanley did get with Blanche, the key reason to this assumption is due to Blanche’s change in physical behavior. Blanche is a very loud and talkative person who wants attention on her. However, after scene ten, Blanche is quiet, and reserved. I infer that after Stanley got with Blanche, she was scared and fearful of him. In the book Blanche tries to tell Stella, however she doesn’t wish to hear it. Blanche is in a corner to which there is no escape, and I do believe this is when Blanche losses her mind completely. The ending of the book proves this theory correct, stating, “Blanche [holding tight to his arm] Whoever you are-I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.” This suggests that Blanche is not herself, and that something is physically and mentally wrong with her. I personally deem the ending of the book a big eye opener, not only for the characters, but to the audience as well. The ending shows how Blanche has changed from being stable minded, to being mentally broken. The ending of the play, especially, suggests that something sinister has happened to Blanche.
Delicate Blanche, virile Stanley. Dynamic Maggie, impotent Brick. Williams' protagonists are distinctly different in temperament. In "A Streetcar Named Desire" Blanche exemplifies the stereotypical old south: educated, genteel, obsolete. Stanley is the new south: primitive, crude, ambitious. Blanche, a fading beauty, uses her sugary charm and soft southern ways to attract men. In comparison, Stanley "sizes women up at a glance, with sexual classifications" to "determine the way he smiles at them" (Williams, Street 29). Course and deliberately aggressive, he is a "survivor of the stone age" (Williams, Street 72). Despite their differences they both possess a raw sensuality. In their first confrontation, Blanche's thick display of charm angers and attracts Stanley. He wants her to be truthful and "lay her cards on the table" but simultaneously would "get ideas" about Blanche if she wasn't Stella's sister (Williams, Street 40-41). Their relationship overflows with sexual tension as they battle for Stella. Stanley, the new south, defeats Blanche, the old south. After destroying her chance for security, his sexual assault erases her last traces of sanity.
In scene three Stanley is having his poker party (pg. 57). At this point he is very drunk. Blanche distracting Stanley by listening to the radio instigates him to grab it off the table and toss it out the window. Stella in a state of panic tells everyone to go home which angers Stanley so he chases after her and hits her. This type of behavior is not normal of any human being involved in any relationship. Stanley repeatedly gets what he wants by use of any means possible. In addition the person whoever threatens the existence of his poker game receives a beating, in this case his wife. This scene demonstrates Stanley’s viscous animal like traits with such violence. If what happened here was repeated in today’s society he would find himself in a jail cell with a pending divorce.
Stanley oftenly abuses Stella whenever he is drunk. One night, Stanley brings his friends over for a poker night. Mitch leaves the table in order to talk to Blanche. Stanley begins to get furious since Mitch is no longer playing. As more and more interruptions keep occurring, Stanley is furious and breaks the radio Blanche and Mitch were using. Stella then calls Stanley an animal. “He advances and disappears. There is a sound of a blow. Stella cries out.”(57) Stanley is usually abusive when he's either drunk or frustrated. After Stanley strikes her, Stella leaves the house and goes to her neighbors house. Blanche follows her sister upstairs to support Stella so she does not feel alone. Stanley then calms down and calls for Stella to come back. She returns and falls into Stanley's arms. Stella is very loyal to Stanley, she stays with him because he is her husband and does not want to change that. This is why she ignores her sister's pleas. Stanleys actions prove to the reader that he is an abusive husband to Stella and that Stella tolerates
The character Stanley represents the theme of reality. Stanley Kowalski is the simple blue-collar husband of Stella. His actions, reactions, and words show reality in its harshest most purist form. His actions are similar to a primitive human. For example he doesn’t close the door when he uses the restroom. This rudeness represents the harsh reality that Blanche refuses to accept. Moreover, when he was drunk he hit Stella. This attack on Blanches sister could be a symbolic “wake up” slap to the face of Blanche.
which, as Williams suggests, "was too great for her to contain". As to whether her escape was "madness" can be debatable - although Blanche is clearly unstable at many points, some believe that Blanche is not. actually insane, suggested by Stella's comment in Scene 11 - "I. couldn't believe her story and go on living with Stanley. " From her first appearance on stage, Blanche is presented as being.
However, there are also many instances where Stanley, a common working-class man, reveals his desire to be powerful and manly in his relationship with Stella, a woman who is of high class. Stanley is a man from a poor background and is married to a woman with a rich family history. Logically, Stanley may feel intimidated by Stella’s upbringing and feels that it is crucial to oppress her; it is hinted many times throughout the play as Stanley clearly demonstrates he is the one that holds the power by the way he treats Stella. Right from the start of the play, with Stanley’s introduction, he comes “around the corner… [with] a red-stained package from a butcher’s” (4), much like how an animal would bring its kill back home. With this, it is an analogy to a leader, Stanley, of a pack that brings back the food for the others to eat. The reliance of Stanley to bring back home the food broadcasts his will as the almighty alpha male that holds more importance than Stella. Furthermore, Stanley “heaves the meat at her (Stella),” (4) treating her as like a servant and also making a sexual innuendo. This action is one of disrespect and lets Stella know that she is under Stanley. This is an example of Stanley seeing Stella as a slave, a sexual object, under his control. Control is a large factor to Stanley as a husband and as a person. This is apparent when Stella explains that “Stanley doesn’t
She struggles with Stanley’s ideals and shields her past. The essential conflict of the story is between Blanche, and her brother-in-law Stanley. Stanley investigates Blanche’s life to find the truth of her promiscuity, ruining her relationships with Stella, and her possible future husband Mitch, which successfully obtain his goal of getting Blanche out of his house. Blanche attempts to convince Stella that she should leave Stanley because she witnessed a fight between the two. Despite these instances, there is an essence of sexual tension between the two, leading to a suspected rape scene in which one of their arguments ends with Stanley leading Blanche to the bed.
Throughout Tennessee William’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.
Madness is used as a theme in literature to explore the depths of the human mind. People experience and react to madness in various ways. In literary works such as The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman and A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams madness is characterized by detachment from reality and delusions. The madness that the Narrator and Blanche experience is caused by their attempts to ease their loneliness. In The Yellow Wallpaper the narrator, who is subjected to the rest cure and isolated from the world, immerses herself in the world she creates within the wallpaper to ease her loneliness and in A Streetcar Named Desire Blanche Dubois deludes herself and those around her into believing that she is a proper lady
Also, the repetitive comparison of him to an animal or ape is the perfect image not the id as it is the instinctive part of your psyche. The way this passage leaves the reader is very powerful saying that “maybe he’ll strike you” is a good example of Stanley’s aggressive nature, and when Blanche says “or maybe grunt and kiss you” is a very good example of his sexual nature.
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.
This gradual fall and loss of her sense of reality is truly tragic. Blanche is a person largely driven by the part of her that wants to be liked and be accepted. She cares greatly about how she is viewed and how she looks which is seen throughout the play. Even at the end when she’s living almost completely in the imaginations of her mind she asks Stella and Eunice how she looks before being taken away to an insane asylum. Tennessee Williams, the author of the play, uses all the conflict between Blanche and others, specifically Stanley, to show that fantasy is unable to overcome reality. Stanley and Blanche are both the epitomes of fantasy and reality. Stanley is a man focused on sexual drive, work, and fighting. He is exhibited as animalistic and strongly driven by his desires which is shown when he says, “Be comfortable. That's my motto up where I come from.” Stanley loves and searches after reality which is why he is so set on breaking down the facade he sees in Blanche. Blanche on the other hand is running from her reality and her past. Her fantasy of being high class and chaste is the exact opposite of her reality which is why she wants a life like that so badly. She wants marriage and stability, two things she was jealous of Stella having after arriving in New Orleans. Her fantasy she was building in her new life is shattered when Stanley is able to learn of her past and bring reality crashing down on her. Williams
3. How might we get to the bald truth/reality of Stanley and Stella 's relationship during the poker game? How are we supposed to understand Stella 's motivation for being/staying with Stanley, despite his physical abusiveness? (that is, on what is their relationship based/founded/sustained)? How does the discovery of these things affect the relationship between Blanche and Stella, and why is this important?
In 'A Streetcar Named Desire' we focus on three main characters. One of these characters is a lady called Blanche. As the play progresses, we gradually get to know more about Blanche and the type of person she really is in contrast to the type of person that she would like everybody else to think she is. Using four main mediums, symbolism and imagery, Blanche's action when by herself, Blanche's past and her dialogue with others such as Mitch, Stanley and the paperboy, we can draw a number of conclusions about Blanche until the end of Scene Five. Using the fore mentioned mediums we can deter that Blanche is deceptive, egotistical and seductive.
Stanley (Stella's husband) represents a theme of realism in the play; he is shown as a primitive, masculine character that is irresistible to Stella and on some levels even to his "opponent" Stella's sister Blanche.