Streetcar desire

A detailed Summary of Streetcar desire

In Tennesse Williams' play, "A Streetcar Named Desire" the readers are introduced to a character named Blanche DuBois. In the plot, Blanche is Stella's younger sister who has come to visit Stella and her husband Stanley in New Orleans. After their first meeting Stanley develops a strong dislike for Blanche and everything associated with her. Among the things Stanley dislikes about Blanche are her "spoiled-girl" manners and her indirect and quizzical way of conversing. Stanley also believes that Blanche has conned him and his wife out of the family mansion. In his opinion, she is a good-for-nothing "leech" that has attached itself to his household, and is just living off him. Blanche's lifelong habit of avoiding unpleasant realities leads to her breakdown as seen in her irrational response to death, her dependency, and her inability to defend herself from Stanley's attacks. The antagonism between Blanche and Stanley is central to the play, providing a direct conflict.

Blanche's situation with her husband is the key to her later behavior. She married rather early at the age of sixteen to whom a boy she believed was a perfect gentleman. He was sensitive, understanding, and civilized much like herself coming from an aristocratic back

Her husband's death affects her greatly and determines her behavior from then on. Having lost Allan, who meant so much to her, she is blinded by the light and from then on never lights anything stronger than a dim candle. This behavior is evident when she first comes to Stella's and puts a paper lantern over the light bulb. Towards the end, when the doctor comes for Blanche and she says she forgot something, Stanley hands her the paper lantern. Even Mitch notices that she cannot stand the pure light, and therefore refuses to go out with him during the daytime or to well lit places. Blanche herself says "I can't stand a naked light bulb any more than ...". A hate for bright light isn't the only affect on Blanche after Allan's death - she needs to fill her empty heart, and so she turns to a lifestyle of one-night-stands with strangers. She tries to comfort herself from not being able to satisfy Allan, and so Blanche makes an effort to satisfy strangers, thinking that they need her and that she can't fail them like she failed Allan. At the same time she turns to alcohol to avoid the brutality of death. The alcohol seems to ease her through the memories of the night of Allan's death. Overtime the memory comes back to her, the musical tune from the incident doesn't end in her mind until she has something alcoholic to drink. All of these irrational responses to death seem to signify how Blanche's mind is unstable, and yet she tries to still be the educated, well-mannered, and attractive person that Mitch first sees her as. She tries to not let the horrid-ness come out on top of her image, wanting in an illusive and magical world instead. Blanche's world is full of grays and pastel colors. She cannot stand a vulgar remark, a loud noise, or a harsh light. With Allan's departure, the light had gone out of her life, seemingly forever. As a result, she prefers darkness and dim candlelight, the perfect setting for her make-believe world that has no pain or memories. It also hides the reality of her departed youth and advancing age. Blanche prefers to be an ethereal character, living on the edge of the world. Blanche is an escapist who says, "I don't want realism. I want magic! Yes, yes, Magic! I try to give that to people. I misrepresent things to them. I don't tell the truth, I tell what ought to be the truth." (Williams 177). She hides from bright lights, just as she hides from the truth. Her delicate nature simply cannot bear the reality of present-day existence; she finds it too painful. She, therefore, convinces herself that she has remained pure because "inside, I never lied". She knows that her soul, or inner self, remained uninvolved in her physical encounters. As a result, she dismisses them and sees herself as virtuous, prim, and proper.

ground. She was truly in love with Allen whom she considered perfect in every way. Unfortunately for her he was a homosexual. As she caught him one evening in their house with an older man, she said nothing, permitting her disbelief to build up inside her. Sometime later that evening, while the two of them were dancing, she told him what she had s

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 2092
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English