Analysis Of A Streetcar Named Desire By Tennessee Williams

Unlike character, characterization can be defined as methods an author uses to create the characters. Two examples an author can use are direct characterization where a character is directly described by the author, and indirect characterization where the character is revealed by their actions, reactions of other characters, thought, and speech. There are a few scenes in the play where the author directly describes a character. One example of major direct characterization comes from scene one in which Stanley is first introduced and described. Tennessee Williams writes, “Branching out from this complete and satisfying center are all the auxiliary channels of his life, such as his heartiness with men, his appreciation of rough humor, his love of good drink and food and games, his car, his radio, everything that is his emblem of the gaudy seed-bearer.” (Williams 84). His description of Stanley gives the reader a picture of how he acts and how he will act throughout the rest of the story. Much of the indirect characterization of the play can also be centered around the heated topic of sensuality. Blanche is an important character whose characterization heavily relies on her actions related to sensuality, and other’s reactions to her actions. “Blanche waltzes to the music with romantic gestures. Mitch is delighted and moves in awkward imitation like a dancing bear.” (Williams 97). This quote shows the relationship between Blanche and Mitch, a potential love interest, after she

The "Blue Piano" playing from the nearby saloon functions much like a score would in a movie. It is a form of mood setter. The music is deliberate and does not occur in every scene but rather in intense situations for instance in scene..... where Blanche and Stella discusses the loss of Belle Reeve. It signals danger and conflict such as the rape scene. The "Blue Piano" is introduced in the first stage direction setting the tone for the genre of the play, a tragedy, since it brings up connotations to the idiom "feeling blue", an unhappy state of mind. The choice of music is also true to the setting. "In this part of New Orleans you are practically always around the corner, or a few doors down the street, from a tinny piano being played with the infatuated fluency of brown fingers. This "Blue Piano" expresses the spirit of the life which goes on here" (p.1778). New Orleans is described as a "cosmopolitan" (p.1778) city because of the majorly liberal attitude its inhabitants have to interracial associations.

Elysian Fields means heaven, but in reality Blanche views this place as hell. She can not believe that Stella would live in such a poor apartment after the life they grew up living. The apartment also plays a crucial role in the play. The fact that the apartment has only three rooms and only curtains instead of doors between the rooms allows for the events of the play to unfold. Due to the fact that the apartment is so small it causes many confrontations between Blanche and Stanley. This is most evident during the poker game scene. Blanche and Stella return to the apartment while the poker game is still underway. Blanche turns on the radio and Stanley immediately yells to turn it off. This and other factors all lead to an argument and ultimately lead to Stanley hitting Stella. This may not have happened if Stanley and Stella lived in a luxurious home with many rooms, because then Blanche and Stella would not have had to be in contact with Stanley.

“Stella has embraced him with both arms, fiercely, and full in the view of Blanche. He laughs and clasps her head to him. Over her head he grins through the curtains at Blanche.” (Williams 73) A Streetcar Named Desire written by Tennessee Williams exemplifies the theme of a struggle to attain happiness. The play not only portrays this theme in its characters and setting, but through the literary devices of Foil, Imagery, and Intertextuality. Williams took great care in applying each of these literary device techniques to the theme as he presents an intriguing contrast between Blanche and Stanley, vivid images both animalistic and broken, and imploring the use of the Odyssey to further

    The author use Blanche and Stella see how the male companions as their only happiness and depend on the men to do stuff. In scene three it show the boys are playing poker around the kitchen table and drinking whiskey and very noisy in Stanley house during that time Blanche and Stella were not welcome while the boys is playing poker. While the boys were playing poker and the girls gossip and listen to the radio, but Stanley was mad at the noise the girl make because he loss major of his money from playing poker. “[ Stanley stalks fiercely through the portieres into the bedroom. He crosses to the small white radio

In Tennessee Williams’ play A Streetcar Named Desire, Williams explores the internal conflict of illusion versus reality through the characters. Humans often use illusion to save us pain and it allows us to enjoy pleasure instead. However, as illusion clashes with reality, one can forget the difference between the two. When people are caught up in their illusions, eventually they must face reality even if it is harsh. In the play, Blanche suffers from the struggle of what is real and what is fake because of the difficult events of her past. Blanche comes to her sister Stella seeking aid because she has lost her home, her job, and her family. To deal with this terrible part of her life, she uses fantasy to escape her dreadful reality. Blanche’s embracement of a fantasy world can be categorized by her attempts to revive her youth, her relationship struggles, and attempts to escape her past.

In the classic fairytale of Cinderella, the main character is trapped in an abusive household. However, Cinderella’s self-perception of optimism and hope, enables her to believe that ultimately, her life will naturally improve with these attributes. True to her convictions, Cinderella gets her happily ever after by going to the ball where the prince falls in love with her. Cinderella is saved from her evil. On the other hand, Cinderella can be viewed as a victim who does nothing to enable herself to escape her abusive reality, insteads helplessly waits for fate to intervene. She does not confront the situation nor independently strive to improve her circumstances. Correspondingly, how individuals act when faced with conflict is strongly influenced by their self-perception. It is possible to become confused between reality and illusion, which is determined by their level of self-awareness. In Tennessee Williams’ play, A Streetcar Named Desire, the character of Stella struggles between the control of her husband and sister. Throughout the play, this conflict is demonstrated as she struggles with becoming aware of her abusive household and the contrast to the fairytale illusion she desperately clings to. Ultimately, Stella’s choice to maintain her illusion, rather than confronting her reality, is due to the self-perception of her need to depend on others and desire for idealism, which overall controls her fate.

How does Williams present the themes of illusion and fantasy in A Streetcar Named Desire?

  Returning to the beginning of the play, Blanche, shocked with the dirtiness and gloominess of Stella and Stanley's home in New Orleans, looks out the window and says "Out there I suppose is the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir!", to which Stella replies "No honey, those are the L and N tracks." Blanche would assume that something so common and simple as noisy, dark railroad tracks might as well be "ghoul-haunted woodlands."   Further evidence of Blanche's warped view of reality and fantasy is shown throughout the entire play.   She seems to hint to Stella and Stanley, and therefore the audience, that she is actually much more than she seems.

Tennessee Williams was an American writer known for short stories and poems in the mid 1950’s. His more famous writing was A Streetcar Named Desire. His writings influenced many other writers such as August Strindberg and Hart Crane. His writings A Streetcar Named Desire and The Glass Menagerie was adopted to films and A Streetcar Named Desire earned him his first Pulitzer prize. In A Streetcar Named Desire there is many elements that build the plot and story line. The story is about a girl who is drove crazy by his sister’s husband and eventually sent to the mental hospital. The main plot is towards the end of the story when Blanche Dubois is blackmailed by her sister’s husband and raped by him. Everything takes its toll on her until she begins drinking heavily and is thought to have gone crazy and placed in a mental hospital. In this story, many things play affect in the contrast of the writing such as Blanche arriving at her sister’s house, seeing her sister’s husbands attitude, the poker game, Blanche getting raped. These events make Blanche an easy victim. In Tennessee Williams, a street car named desire, the start of kindness turns to tragedy and pain.

“Symbols are nothing but the natural speech of drama…the purest language of plays.” Once, quoted as having said this, Tennessee Williams has certainly used symbolism and colour extremely effectively in his play, ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’. A moving story about fading Southern belle Blanche DuBois and her lapse into insanity, ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ contains much symbolism and clever use of colour. This helps the audience to link certain scenes and events to the themes and issues that Williams presents within the play, such as desire and death, and the conflict between the old America and the new.

This 1950's theatrical presentation was directed by Elia Kazan and written by Tennessee Williams. It is about a southern bell by the name of Blanche Dubois who loses her father's plantation to a mortgage and travels to live in her sister's home in New Orleans by means of a streetcar called Desire. There she finds her sister living in a mess with a drunken bully husband, and the events that follow cause Blanche to step over the line of insanity and fall victim to life's harsh lessons.

Some novels and plays seem to advocate changes in social or political attitudes or in traditions. Choose such a novel or play and note briefly the particular attitudes or traditions that the author apparently wishes to modify. Then analyze the techniques the author uses to influence the reader or audience’s views. Avoid plot summary.

Tennessee Williams' Use of Imagery and Symbolism in A Streetcar Named Desire Throughout the play symbolism is used to capture attention and to appeal to viewers' emotions. It is expressed through music, colour and imagery all of which help to heighten tension and reflect the atmosphere created by an impending force.

Summary: An analysis of some of the many symbols found in "A Streetcar Named Desire" by Tennessee Williams, with the help of psychoanalytical theory. Williams' expert use of these symbols helped him to convey the meaning of many characteristics of the protagonists in the play. It is very debatable nowadays how much psychology can influence an author or how much the author's psychological features can influence his work.