Blanche facade

Question 1

‘delicate beauty must avoid the light’

Answer 1

any obstruction to this façade will be fatal to Blanche

Question 2

‘white suit’ ‘white gloves’

Answer 2

all exterior chooses to be this way

Question 3

‘white frame’ ‘rickety frame’

Answer 3

instability and caution

Question 4

‘replacing the bottle’

Answer 4

incessant habit of erasing evidence, anti- febrile femininity

Question 5

‘polka rises up’

Answer 5

• only audible to her,

- become internal and privatized - convinced herself façade is real

Question 6

i cant be alone’

Answer 6

monosyllabic, lack of complex thought (like Stanley)

Question 7

scene 2

Answer 7

1) ‘Blanche is bathing’

2) ‘Now you’ve touched them, I’ll burn them’

Question 8

‘blanche is bathing’

Answer 8

• throughout the whole play,
• redundancy of constant bathing,
• can’t forget her past

Question 9

scene 3

Answer 9

1) ‘paper lantern’

2) ‘screams and runs into the kitchen’

Question 10

‘paper lantern’

Answer 10

hides the naked light bulb-

- prevents the truth ‘paper’ = fragile

Question 11

‘screams and runs into the kitchen’

Answer 11

typical female reaction, goes to place of comfort, attempt to restore order she knows how

Question 12

scene 5

Answer 12

1) ‘A disturbance is heard upstairs’
2) ‘did he kill her?’
3) flamingo’
4) ‘there is a murmur of thunder’

Question 13

‘A disturbance is heard upstairs’

Answer 13

• structural choice
• abrupt interruption of the lie
• walls are permeable limitations to privacy

Question 14

‘did he kill her?’

Answer 14

• syntax
• immediate assumption Steve was hit
• links to Eunice ‘I heard’ - immediate assumption abuse
• comment on all men in play and normalization

Question 15

flamingo

Answer 15

Blanche looks at the world through rose tinted glasses, illusion

Question 16

‘there is a murmur of thunder’

Answer 16

-pathetic fallacy

=gentility of Blanche challenged- ‘murmur’ = beginning of deterioration

Question 17

scene 6

Answer 17

1) ‘while I take a last look at the sky’

2) ‘huddles in his embrace’

Question 18

‘while I take a last look at the sky’

Answer 18

sky is expansive - distant desire to escape

Question 19

‘huddles in his embrace’

Answer 19

• makes rape more abhorred
• clearly not society fault
• compare to Stella and Stan relationship she ‘embrace with both arms’ after abuse

Question 20

scene 7

Answer 20

1) ‘Canary Bird’

2) ‘saccharine’

Question 21

‘saccharine’

Answer 21

artificial sweetener, illusions to artificially romantisize

Question 22

‘Canary Bird’

Answer 22

• known for melodious song
• in a cage domestic bird
• Blanche trapped in hotel for pleasures for others

Question 23

scene 8

Answer 23

1) ‘diagonal green’
2) ‘Southern comfort’
3) ‘it must belong to Stan’
4) ‘ I don’t want realism.. I want magic’
5) ‘tarantula’
6) ‘the distant piano is slow and blue’

Question 24

‘diagonal green’

Answer 24

• ‘diagonal’ =- imbalanced, fractured state of mind

- ‘green’ - Stanley’s bowler shirt = foreshadowing his dominance

Question 25

‘it must belong to Stan’

Answer 25

foreshadows rape, everything in house belongs to Stanley

Question 26

’ I don’t want realism.. I want magic’

Answer 26

-traumatised, realism and truth brought her tragedy, -‘magic’ = idyliic for your desires- hamartia unwillingness to embrace past

Question 27

‘tarantula’

Answer 27

• periodically shed external skeletons whilst organs regrow

- Blanche façade fades when memory of past regrow

Question 28

‘the distant piano is slow and blue’

Answer 28

• before ‘blue piano’ = seperation of sanity

Question 29

scene 10

Answer 29

1) ‘ dragged her wardrobe trunk to the center of the room’
2) ‘somewhat soiled and crumpled satin evening gown
3) ‘moonlight swim’
4) ‘prostitute’
5) ‘she smashes a bottle on the table’

Question 30

’ dragged her wardrobe trunk to the center of the room’

Answer 30

contains wealthy things, this facde is central

Question 31

‘somewhat soiled and crumpled satin evening gown’

Answer 31

• foreshadows loss of purity and innocecence will be tampered with

Question 32

‘moonlight swim

Answer 32

oft and romantic light- not critical like the sun

Question 33

‘prostitute

Answer 33

drunkard and thief- Blanche’s outside world merging with inside

Question 34

‘she smashes a bottle on the table’

Answer 34

• ironic hamartia is using alcohol to escape reality

- mental to physical now protection

Question 35

’ it is some weeks later’

Answer 35

• life continues on after violence occurrence
• people have to live with trauma
• other openings very specific, lack of structure

Question 36

scene 11

Answer 36

1) ‘ it is some weeks later’
2) ‘kitchen raw’
3) ‘and when I die, I’m going to die on the sea’

Question 37

‘kitchen raw

Answer 37

even domestic life has been masculinised

Question 38

‘and when I die, I’m going to die on the sea’

Answer 38

• romanticizing death,
• giving up fantasy in life but in death
• sea’ = vast, not specific she’s caught between two world old and new America

Question 39

‘moves towards the light’

Answer 39

changed attitude towards light, internal conflict with idealism and true desires
- link to Williams unappreciated homosexulatity and Blanche’s promiscuity