Characters in The Glass Menagerie Of the three main characters in Tennessee Williams’s ‘The Glass Menagerie’ Amanda is set to appear as the most dominant and in control. As the mother of the family unit the audience expects her to hold some kind of responsibility over her children as well as providing for them. The idea of the sense of duty she has for Tom and Laura’s future still remains even when the audience discover that the person financially supporting the Wingfields is actually Tom. Amanda Wingfield is in many ways like most parents. She only wants what she thinks is best for her children. In the ‘Glass Menagerie’ this can be a strength and a weakness. Amanda believes that gentlemen callers will be chasing after Laura and she constantly reminds Laura that she should be prepared. She blindly believes that these gentlemen callers will arrive which is a strength because she tries to boost Laura’s self confidence. The reality is that there are no gentlemen callers. The weakness of the situation is that Amanda is living in a dream world where she believes that h...
... She comforts the Wilsons, feeds the starving nameless faces when she barely has enough for her own family, works together with the Wainwrights, and as the novel closes she is still directing her assistance to those who are in need any way she can, by helping the starving man and taking control of the situation. She feels that as long as she can hold on to some part of the family, she will see to it that they keep on going.
In "Death of a Salesman", Willy Loman believes the ticket to success is likeability. He tells his sons, "The man who makes an appearance in the business world, the man who creates personal interest, is the man who gets ahead." In "The Glass Menagerie", Amanda Wingfield has the same belief. Girls are meant to be attractive and they are meant to be attractive in order to entertain gentlemen callers. As she tells Laura, "All pretty girls are a trap, a pretty trap, and men expect them to be" (1048). It is this very belief that both Amanda and Willy try to ingrain in their children and it is this emphasis on likeability that makes the characters of Amanda Wingfield and Willy Loman so unlikable.
In Williams, Tennessee’s play The Glass Menagerie, Amanda’s image of the southern lady is a very impressive. Facing the cruel reality, she depends on ever memories of the past as a powerful spiritual to look forward to the future, although her glory and beautiful time had become the past, she was the victim of the social change and the Great Depression, but she was a faithful of wife and a great mother’s image cannot be denied.
Oscar Wilde once said, “Everything in the world is about sex except sex. Sex is about power.” The content of this quote embodies A Doll’s House and The Glass Menagerie because of the sexual control in both the plays. A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen and The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee William, the characters, although from different time periods, face the hardships of sexual control through the men they admire. Nora is written as the naive protagonist of A Doll’s House, who embodies the themes of the novella as she matures throughout the play. Nora learns that her husband, Torvald, uses her as a doll for his own pleasure and does not truly care for her. In The Glass Menagerie, Laura, the main character, is also
her concern for the welfare of her darling little child. It seems odd that this
Tennessee Williams’ play, The Glass Menagerie, depicts the Wingfield family in a naturalistic viewpoint that highlights the importance of a man in the life of a woman. Without a husband in the play, Amanda’s son Tom is rendered as “the man of the house.” Williams attributes the monetary stability of the Wingfields entirely to Tom. Williams stresses the necessity of a working man through Tom so that women and children can be financially stable. As a naturalist, Tennessee Williams illustrates the characters’ reactions to various events and circumstances in accordance with man’s natural instincts of survival. Williams reveals Amanda in this approach, and he portrays naturalistic tendencies in her personality and character, her relationship with her son, and her connection with her hopeless daughter, Laura. Amanda is trying to survive and raise her children without a husband to support her economically.
Dysfunctional. Codependent. Enmeshed. Low self-esteem. Emotional problems of the modern twenty-first century or problems of the past? In his play, The Glass Menagerie, Tennessee Williams portrays a southern family in the 1940's trying to deal with life's pressures, and their own fears after they are deserted by their husband and father. Although today, we have access to hundreds of psychoanalysis books and therapists, the family problems of the distant past continue to be the family problems of the present.
of - was charm!' - or trails off - 'And then I - (she stops in front
The unlikely pair of “The Glass Menagerie” by Tennessee Williams and “A Doll House” by Henrik Ibsen do share multiple similarities in their domestic situations and in the things they chose to do. . When comparing these two plays you also have to keep in mind about how that both the plays were done in different time periods. Therefore things are going to be different when it comes to the roles of the women. With the “The Glass Menagerie” and “A Doll House” all the characters have flaws, lived in different time period, felt like they were trapped in ways, and reacted to things differently.
Society as a gilded cage refers to people living a life with boundaries. The people living this type of life don’t live life to its full potential because they feel as though there are limits to what they can do. Two examples of individuals living this type of life would be Tom from a “Glass Menagerie” and Nora from “Doll House”. Both these individuals had the opportunity to live a free life but felt as though they had limits causing them to live a restrained life. Although both individuals seemed to be complete opposites they shared similar characteristics.
Everybody has something about them that makes them unique, but sometimes they tend to not realize how special they are because of it. In the play, The Glass Menagerie, Laura possesses a collection of glass figurines that symbolize how others see her despite her limp. She has allowed her limp to define who she is, as well as play a major part in the way that she acts around other people. Laura’s limp has restricted her life in certain ways and because of it, she has become a delicate, radiant, and unique individual.
In The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, the glass figurine of the unicorn plays an inherently important role as a representation of Laura's self esteem. The collection of glass figurines is used by Laura to escape from the dangers of the outside world. The unicorn is the central piece to her collection and is important because it directly symbolizes Laura. The unicorn represents Laura's obsession with her handicap and also represents the uniqueness in her character. As the play develops, the fracture of the unicorn's horn represents a change in Laura's perspective of self and also gives a reason to why she parts with the figurine in the end.
written in between 384 and 222 BC, and his views were taken on by some
When evaluating Mr. and Mrs. Bennet’s role in the family structure, they both provide insight into the origins of their daughters’ personalities. Mr. and Mrs. Bennet both play integral parts in their children’s lives; they give or attempt to give them guidance in marriage, in happiness, and in love. Whether it’s Mrs. Bennet expressing her over-bearing love or Mr. Bennet giving Elizabeth some well-needed advice, they both aim to help their daughters using their inborn parental love.
How Far She Has Fallen At first glance, Amanda Wingfield from Tennessee Williams’s The Glass Menagerie seems like a selfish woman stuck in her past. In some ways this observation is correct; however, she is much more than that. Her kind and caring nature, and her insatiable love for her children, has been overshadowed by her brash and insensitive dialogue. Her character is extremely complex and each one of her actions reveals more of her overwhelming personality.