Characterisation in A Streetcar Named Desire Essay

A Streetcar Named Desire

In A Streetcar Named Desire, Tennessee Williams gave totally different and unique personalities among the main characters, Blanche Dubois and Stanley Kowalski. In a macro sense, they are representations of two contrasting regions in the U.S.: Laurel in the Southern region, a traditional aristocratic region, and New Orleans, the world industrial centre and a cosmopolitan city (according to Tennessee Williamss stage direction). Hence, they were affected by the social and cultural values in the two worlds at the same time. Although their backgrounds seem to be incompatible, when these two different people clashed, we can find a trend of changing of a local belief in a developing world.

In the social aspect, we can find different social manners from Stanley and Blanche due to their different social beliefs. Traditional social hierarchy can be shown from the snobbish behaviors of Blanche. She despised the people from common class because she believed that she is more superior to those people in terms of her education, intelligence and her refined character. When Blanche first arrived in Stanleys apartment, she was shocked that her sister lived in such a scanty apartment. Also, she played tricks on Mitchs incapability on French to satisfy her vanity: Voulez-vous couches avec moi ce soir? Vous ne comprenez pas? Ah, quelle dommage! (In English: Would you like to sleep with me this evening? You dont understand? Ah, what a pity!) Besides, she strongly discouraged Stella to get along with this common man because of his primitiveness and rudeness. And she always used some offensive expressions like vulgar, Polack and animal to describe Stanley.

Nevertheless, social hierarchy was not welcomed in the News Orleans anymore. Stanley hated the snobbery of Blanche and he was a social leveler in his household. He showed this belief in scene 8: What do you two think you are? A pair of queens? Remember what Huey Long said Every Man is a King! And I am the king around here, so dont forget it! Here, Stanley reclaimed the males power not only because he hated the snobbish behaviours of Blanche, but also he believed that it was what the society should be. For example, he enlightened Stella and Blanche about the Napoleonic Code which is a civil law in the city, saying that what belongs to the wife belongs to the husband, vice versa. However, the ignorance and the negative attitude of Stella and Blanche towards the code implied that it is not the traditional social value their society adopted. Hence, as the world modernized, people gradually gave up the traditional hierarchical belief.

In cultural aspect, by observing the lifestyle of Blanche and Stanley, we can find that peoples enthusiasm towards arts, the sense of aesthetic and literary appreciation and the initiatives of beautifying their life was fading out. Blanche was an art-lover. She loved dancing with the polka tune in the radio, decorating her room by putting a paper lantern on the light and appreciating the inscription of Mitchs lighter written by her favourite poet. Fantasy and beauty is obviously her main pursuits, and most aristocratic peoples pursuits. However, these were things that Stanley would never care about. Bowling, drinking and sex were his amusement. There is no sense of art in his mind. Also, his extreme care about Stellas Belle Reve and his interests towards gambling revealed that money is important to him. Furthermore, he did not care the cute appearance of women, but whether they lay her cards on the table or not. Clearly, what he desired is something more practical and concrete.

Regarding to the sexual and love issues, the two main characters had different views towards that. When Blanche was young, she cherished her relation with her husband very well. She kept all his love letters carefully in her own private place. She did not want anybody to touch them as they were holy to her. Hence, the discovering of the homosexuality of her husband was a great strike and hurt to her. Then, her affairs became more complex and her sexual relationships with male became unrestrained. These led her to become a social pariah in the Southern. These revealed that sexual relation is a serious and even holy issue in the Southern rural. Complicated sexual behaviours were social unacceptable and homosexuality even aroused social despise. To Stanley, women were his pleasure of life since his earliest manhood caused he thought he was proud to himself. Also, after she rapped Blanche, no regrets or guilty were shown, but he is Stellas husband and Blanche was her wifes sister. When the city was modernized, sexual values on people were also modernized. They adopted a more open and less serious attitude on the issues of sex.

The relation between characters can also give us some insights in the changing of the social status of male and female. In the play, we can find that men were mainly the economic cellars in their families as all the workers mentioned are male. Also, Stanleys violent behaviours in the poker night were just like an indirect declaration of his controlling power in his house. He could just throw the radio and even beat his wife when he found the women was doing something unfit or he disliked. It seemed that the power and status of women was becoming weak. This point was further highlighted by the extreme delicate character of Blanche. She was like a fallen woman in the Southern who escaped to New Orleans. At that time, she was economically poor, physically weak (because of her age), visually faint (her delicate beauty avoiding dark), emotionally unstable (could be easily hurt and recalled sad memory always) and socially abandoned (due to her complicated past of her sexual affairs). She could do nothing but deceiving Mitch to make him want her: Yes I want Mitch very badly! Just think! If it happens! I can leave here and not be anyones problem In that situation, Stella could not save Blanche as she could not leave her husband either. Only men can be her saviours. Her total dependency on man which she developed in New Orleans further revealed the decline of women status in a modernized world.

In presenting the loss of the traditional values of the Southern aristocracy in a world which was on the trend of modernization and industrialization, the contrast of the thinking and behaviours of protagonists (i.e. Blanche and Stanley) are the most important part to contribute. The importance of the choice of setting should not be neglected at the same time.