A Streetcar Named Desire

Question 1

Life of Tennessee Williams

Answer 1

March 26th 1911- February 25th 1983

Question 2

What did Tennessee struggle with in his life?

Answer 2

Personal struggle with homosexuality, alcoholism and a fragile mental state

Question 3

Importance of Williams’ mother

Answer 3

She was a southern Belle

Question 4

Who coloured the portrayal of Stanley?

Answer 4

Williams’ boyfriend Pancho

Question 5

When was the play first performed?

Answer 5

1947

Question 6

The state of America during the time of writing and publishing the play

Answer 6

• Rapid industrialisation in cities
• Huge divide of North and South
• Nation ready to embrace old fashioned values of family and home

Question 7

Economic impacts of America

Answer 7

• Wall street crash of 1929 led to the ‘Great Depression’ of 1930’s
• Huge unemployment, high interest rates, debt

Question 8

New Orleans’ railway line

Answer 8

• The streetcar line was the oldest operating the US
  It began service in 1835 and by 1922 it covered 225 miles
  Desire line established in 1920 and was discontinued in 1948

Question 9

Tennessee WIlliams’ childhood

Answer 9

Born in Mississippi in the deep south with an idyllic childhood

Question 10

Culture of New Orleans

Answer 10

• Play set in the French Quarter with architecture being primarily spanish
• French quarter is a melting pot for all races and classes
• Jazz was of special importance in New Orleans, born of musical traditions associated with slavery representing rebellion and sensuality (known as ‘cradle of jazz’)

Question 11

What does Stanley represent

Answer 11

The American Dream

Question 12

What does Blanche represent

Answer 12

Old south where class and race was seriously important

Question 13

Traditional view of Southern Belles

Answer 13

-Seen as delicate and frail to be treated with respect
-Look to others for protection, men in particular

Question 14

Traditional view of Southern men

Answer 14

Seen as gentlemen to act like ‘knights in shining armour’

Question 15

What is the Napoleonic code

Answer 15

Concerned itself with civil law rather than criminal law, preserving traditional inheritance patterns yet also allowing more freedom
- Used still by Louisiana state government

Question 16

Importance of the decline of the southern aristocracy

Answer 16

• Begun after civil war and was evident by WWII when rapid inustrialisation occured leading to Old South radicalising (5 million women in workforce by 1945)
• Shutting down of many plantations

Question 17

Significance of Belle Reve

Answer 17

Demonstrates the Old South values diminishing
- It is a link to Blanche’s ambiguous nature

Question 18

When was the play set

Answer 18

1940’s America
- Two years after the war

Question 19

Prosodic features

Answer 19

The way lines are spoken and connected to each other to create effect

Question 20

Utterances

Answer 20

The manner which characters speak to one another

Question 21

Genre of the play

Answer 21

Melodramatic tragedy

Question 22

What are Blanche’s tragic flaws as a tragic heroine?

Answer 22

• sexual desires
• unable to face reality

Question 23

Grice’s Maxims

Answer 23

The co operative principle of being in a conversation and wishing to be understood
- Maxim of quality
- Maxim of quantity
- Maxim of relation
- Maxim of manner

Question 24

What does J.M Clum critically state

Answer 24

‘In Williams invisible homosexuals they tend to have grotesque deaths and are usually a victim of rejection by those closest to them’

Question 25

What are the ‘coloured lights’ representative of

Answer 25

The liveliness, excitement and the raw lifestyle of Stanley’s society in New Orleans

Stanley is using imagery to show how his relationship with Stella has always been sexual and this is the only way, apart from getting angry, Stanley has of expressing himself and connecting with Stella.

Question 26

Significance of Elysian Fields

Answer 26

’ They told me to take a streetcar named Desire, and transfer to one called Cemeteries, and ride six blocks and get off at- Elysian Fields!’
- Creates a sinister link between Blanche’s fantasy utopia and the harsh realities of the new world
- Originally a paradise in the Underworld in Greek Mythology

Question 27

What is a plastic theatre?

Answer 27

Utilises props, sound, stage direction, and costume to present poetic truths through symbolism.
It is not intended to be realistic, but symbolic
- Williams’ uses the expressionist devices exploited to represent the psyche of the characters

Question 28

Belle Reve symbolism

Answer 28

‘Beautiful dream’ in French
- It represents the façade of Blanche’s desires and visions for the future being simply beautiful fantasies. The dark undertones signify the grandeur of the DuBois family fading
- Also represents the physical representation of the loss Blanche had suffered transforming the plantation into a symbol of decay and death

Question 29

What is a Southern Belle?

Answer 29

Coined during the period of the Antebellum South in the 18th and 19t century
- stock character of a woman with a privileged upbringing from the deep south upper socioeconomic class

Question 30

Irony of Blanche as a Southern Belle?

Answer 30

The men do not respect her; tragically revealed through her rape
- Difference in New Orleans and Old South

Question 31

What is Blanche?

Answer 31

Archetypal southern belle

Question 32

Hegemonic masculinity

Answer 32

The dominant form of masculinity that is privileged and upheld by society.
- characterised by strength, courage, aggression, and the ability to provide and protect.

Question 33

Downfall of Blanche through Stanley

Answer 33

• She attempts to exploit the power rooted in her privilege by emasculating him
• To her misfortune, society accept hegemonic masculinity and the condemnation of women catalysing her own metaphorical death and mental disintegration

Question 34

Stanley’s hate towards Blanche

Answer 34

Stanley’s unforgiveable antagonism towards Blanche is because she poses the biggest threat to his social status and power as a man

Question 35

The Varsouviana Polka symbolism

Answer 35

The polka music plays at various points in A Streetcar Named Desire, when Blanche is feeling remorse for Allen’s death.

The polka and the moment it evokes represent Blanche’s loss of innocence. The suicide of the young husband Blanche loved dearly was the event that triggered her mental decline. Since then, Blanche hears the Varsouviana whenever she panics and loses her grip on reality.

Question 36

Blue piano symbolism

Answer 36

Blanche DuBois’s loneliness and her attachment to a bygone era, as well as her gradual loss of reality.

Represents Blanche’s depression, loneliness and desperation for love

Question 37

Why is Blanche bathing important

Answer 37

Throughout, Blanche bathes herself to an obsessive degree. Her sexual experiences have made her a hysterical woman, but these baths, as she says, calm her nerves. But in actual fact she is trying to cleanse herself of her past sexual encounters.

Question 38

Blanche’s alcohol

Answer 38

Blanche’s drinking is anti-social, and she tries to keep it a secret. She drinks on the sly in order to withdraw from harsh reality. A state of drunken stupor enables her to take a flight of imagination such has with Shep Huntleigh.

Blanches drinking leads to destructive behaviour and alcohol augments Blanche’s gradual departure from sanity

Question 39

What does light symbolise in the play?

Answer 39

Williams uses light to represent truth within the play, in particular Blanche’s fear of the truth about her being revealed or her own fear of facing reality.

William’s use of light to represent Blanche’s past and how Blanche’s fear and attraction to light represents how Blanche desires a return to her former self.