Justin Fetter
Professor Brady
English 102
Is it a warning to avoid alternate realities? Or is it a suggestion to create them. Tennessee Williams is a Pulitzer prize-winning playwright for the play, “A Street Car Named Desire.” He can very much relate to this play because of his unhappy childhood and the dominance of his father that forced him to do unwanted things. This play is about three main characters that have to escape from reality constantly, and create these alternate realities as a result. There are multiple ways that Tennessee Williams explains how to use symbols as a technique to illustrate higher ideas. He uses symbolism and Motif to try and connect certain ideas that are repeated throughout the play. Creating an illusion rather than facing reality is a common trend that cycles through the characters of Stanley, Stella, and Blanche.
Stanley represents the theme “The despoliation of the sensitive and feminine by the feral and masculine.” He deliberately buys Blanche a bus ticket to leave his house and forces it upon her to leave. For example, when he gives the ticket to Blanche he says, “She’ll go on a bus and like it”, also “She’ll go period, P.S she’ll go Tuesday (1216).” This shows how dominant men were in the 1960’s. This bus ticket action by Stanley can actually symbolize his character as a whole. To elaborate, Stanley was abusive and disrespectful throughout the whole play to Stella and Blanche. For example Stanley raping blanche and Stanley constantly screaming at Stella symbolizes who his character is. The bus ticket for Blanche can also symbolize Stanley and Stella’s freedom. Stanley wants Blanche out! He thinks she is ruining his and Stella’s relationship and he wants to be happy again. For example, during the play Stanley freaks out on Stella, (throwing plates, breaking glass), because she calls his hands greasy. Moments later he comes over to Stella and says “Everything is going to be okay when Blanche leaves (Stanley).” He held her close and said “It’s going to be sweet when we can make noise in the night like we used to (Stanley)”. In a way Stanley seemed a little bipolar in that scene going from screaming in Stella’s face to telling her everything is going to be okay. It does show how much he loves Stella and it symbolizes how much he wants that freedom away from Blanches damage. Stanley approaches his desire for freedom a little more civil then what he is known for so that should also show how he just wants everything to be fixed right away and that the bus ticket symbolizes his freedom.
Blanche’s desire to be wanted is a symbol of one of the themes of this play which is “The reluctant or inability to accept the truth.” Her Attitude and actions show how she can’t handle the truth. For example, she flaunts her self and acts like she has so much money when she wears her expensive clothing and handbags and watches, etc. She can’t afford most of the things she has but it doesn’t matter because in her alternate reality that is what makes her happy and she is absolutely blind to the facts. Blanches actions are what symbolize the theme of “The reluctant or inability to accept the truth”. Stanley and Blanches actions during the play make a strong connection to those two themes and are examples of using symbols as a technique to illustrate higher ideas.
There are two motifs that are strongly represented throughout this play. One is illusion and the other is physical and emotional abuse. Stella is actually able to create her own illusion whenever she is near Blanche. She never wants to hear her lies and dirty secrets but it happens so often that she just starts to believe what she is saying. She creates the illusion that everything she is saying is true so she doesn’t have to get involved.
Mainly Stanley shows physical and emotional abuse but Blanche is part of the emotional abuse. To elaborate, Stanley has physically and emotionally abused Stella and Blanche plenty of times. Even early in the play Blanche tries to convince Stella to leave Stanley by saying, “you can still get out”(Blanche). Just the fact that Blanche still has to see Stanley everyday after he absolutely ruined her life is unbearable. This shows that since the beginning Stanley has been physically and emotionally abusive towards these women. Even when Stanley buys that bus ticket because he just wants his freedom, he is too selfish to realize that he is sending Blanche off with no destination or life sources like water, food, shelter, money, etc.
Stanley and Stella also have to overcome the emotional abuse of Blanche and her presence. Besides the fact that Blanche has been physically and emotionally abused by Stanley, she is also causing an emotionally damaging presence when she is around Stanley and Stella.
Stella can definitely be described as stubborn. She creates an alternate reality but is very low-key about it. To elaborate, she doesn’t really do many physical or emotional coping mechanisms. She kind of just mentally deals with it and refuses to hear anything that she doesn’t want to hear or believe. For example, Stella replies, “I don’t want to hear anymore”(1215), after Stanley is trying to explain to her lie number 2 of Blanche. As Stanley continues to rant about Blanche and her lies Stella gets angry and says, “I don’t believe all of those stories and I think your supply man was mean and rotten to tell them (1215).” The reason she replied to him like that was because she needed to stay in her alternate reality. She is very aware of what Stanley was saying but she truthfully didn’t want to hear it and is too stubborn to deal with her sister’s problems. To elaborate on Stella’s characterization of being stubborn, she can also relate to the theme of “The reluctant or inability to accept the truth.” For example, Stella and Blanche were discussing a rich man that Blanche had met earlier in the play. As Blanche describes the long Cadillac that she had got into when she was with him, Stella replies, “ I should think that it would have been inconvenient in traffic”(Stella). Clearly she doesn’t want to believe her, which can tie back to the motif of illusions where she uses Blanches illusion as a coping mechanism thus using Blanche and her lies as an alternate reality. Stanley is described as demanding and rude throughout the whole play. He abused these women and didn’t have much respect. It was as if he was the king of them and he ruled them both. This can relate to how some of the men treated women in New Orleans in the 1960’s. There were a lot of prostitutes at that time and not a lot of people got in trouble for it. Stanley’s actions towards Stella and Blanche represent how some of these prostitutes were treated in the 1960’s. Also a very male dominate time period that can relate to the theme of “dependence on men.”
Tennessee Williams uses many literary elements as a technique to illustrate higher ideas. Symbolism, motif, setting, characterization, and plot all have some kind of relation or can tie back to one another in this play. The relation between these literary elements and the characters are very important in understanding how to illustrate higher ideas. Every one of the examples of literary elements that Tennessee Williams uses can relate back to the thesis of creating an illusion or an alternate reality rather than facing reality.
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