Theme Of Truth In Tennessee Williams Cat On A Hot Tin Roof

When is it okay to tell a lie? Some may say you should lie to spare the feelings of a friend, or to keep yourself out of trouble. However, in a way, lies will always come back around in the end. Therefore the truth is always better than lying because there may be less consequences. This is a lesson that can be observed from Cat on a Hot Tin Roof by Tennessee Williams. The play takes place on an expensive plantation home owned by a wealthy family in Mississippi in the 1950’s. Williams based the whole basis of the play around lies, and even the absence of the truth. The truth was rarely discussed to satisfy the views of society and to keep the Pollitt family together.
The phrase that comes to mind when watching this play in action is “ignorance

is bliss.” The less the characters know or disclose to others, the happier everyone may seem. The damage of lying and hiding the truth, however, is prevalent throughout the entirety of the production. One example of this Brick’s big lie. Throughout the play, the audience can tell that Brick is distressed over the secret about Skipper he has been keeping. He is married and the revelation of his feelings towards Skipper would have been disapproved by his family and society. He admits that he doesn’t love Maggie, by saying “if only that was true” about their love. The scene in Act 2 when Brick reveals the truth about Skipper, it is night time. The set is quiet, Brick being the only one talking and Big Daddy just listening. The setting and lighting of this scene was powerful and made the speech by Brick a lot more intense. This showed how much it had been hurting him and how big of a deal the scene was in relation to the rest of the play. It also made the theme of lies versus the truth a lot more prominent. The scenes between Maggie and Brick alone together also show how they’re simply two people living together. Brick will not sleep with her, making her feel undesirable because he doesn’t love her.
Another scene where the truth is hidden is at Big Daddy’s birthday party when Big Mama says that there’s nothing wrong with him.

It is said that he just has a “spastic colon” and that he’ll be okay. The set up for this scene is supposed to be a happy time, since they are celebrating a birthday. There are many people there, the outfits all bright and lively. Big Mama is crying because she is so happy that there isn’t anything thing fatal about Big Daddy’s illness. The setting plays a big role into this lie because, just like Big Mama, is sugarcoats the truth. Later Big Daddy realizes they were lying about the results from the critic and that it’s not just a spastic colon. He has cancer and is going to die. This news for anyone would be a lot to handle. When he thought it was just something small that wouldn’t kill him, it didn’t matter to him. That lie was used to spare Big Daddy’s feelings. However, in the end, it would have been better to have known the truth to hurt him less.
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof shows what lying could do to someone. The truth is very important because it is clean and doesn’t hide anything. Lying can lead to built up anger and stress, as seen in Brick throughout the play. If Brick had just been honest with himself, he could’ve been happier. The same goes with Big Daddy; he knew that death was coming for him, but ignored it with false information. They are both stubborn men who care about their image. For that reason the truth came too late for them and left them drowning in

lies.