Blanche quotes and critics

Question 1

Blanche admitting to deceit to Mitch

Answer 1

“it is a part of womanhood”

Question 2

Blanche influencing Stella

Answer 2

“pig”“drunk animal thing”- Stella. She copies Blanche’s use of animalistic imagery. Blanche’s manipulation of Stella imposes a threat to Stanley’s dominance.

Question 3

Blanche talking about her trunk

Answer 3

“everything I own is in that trunk”

Question 4

Blanche on bathing MOTIF

Answer 4

“I take hot baths for my nerves. Hydro-therapy, they call it”- alludes to Christian baptism implying water is symbolic of forgiveness from past sins-escape from reality.

Question 5

Blanche and paper lantern MOTIF

Answer 5

“cries out as if the lantern was herself”- stage directions. Paper lantern is central plastic theatre

Question 6

Blanche and desire, cemeteries and Elysian Fields MOTIF

Answer 6

“They told me to take a streetcar named desire, and then transfer to one called cemeteries and ride six blocks and get off at- Elysian fields”-Blanche. Desire for love after death of Allan. Death as fate of patriarchy, also interpreted as death of South. Elysian fields according to myth was a temporary place for souls back to life.

Question 7

Blanche and desire for love

Answer 7

“After the death of Allan- intimacies with strangers was all I seemed able to fill my empty heart with”

Question 8

Blanche on fantasy and realism

Answer 8

“I don’t want realism, I want magic”

Question 9

Blanche and young man

Answer 9

“Young man! Young, young, young, young-man” “honey lamb” -Blanche. Blanche fears ageing and desperately wants to be young by asserting her sexuality on young men. Her drive for destruction links to Freud’s theory of Thanatos

Question 10

Blanche’s last line

Answer 10

“I have always depended on the kinds of strangers”

Question 11

Blanche and the dark

Answer 11

“I like the dark. The dark is comforting to me”

Question 12

Blanche’s appearance in scene 1

Answer 12

“incongruous to the setting” “dressed in a white suit with a fluffy bodice”

Question 13

Blanche and light

Answer 13

“her delicate beauty must avoid a strong light”

“her white clothes suggest a moth”

Question 14

Blanche prompting Stella about her appearance

Answer 14

“I want you to look at my figure!”

Question 15

Blanche’s self awareness

Answer 15

“my looks are slipping” “funerals are pretty compared to deaths”

Question 16

Blanche confronting Stella about Belle Reve

Answer 16

“where were you? In bed with your polack!”

Question 17

Blanche and alcohol

Answer 17

“No, I rarely touch it”- Blanche struggles with her ideal traits of femininity that were embraced by the old south. However Stanley doesn’t face these problems because he is a man- double standards in the patriarchy.
“where could it be? oh I spy, I spy!”

Question 18

Blanche about young love

Answer 18

“its touching to notice them making their first discovery of love”

Question 19

Blanche and her promiscuous past

Answer 19

“I’ve run for protection from one roof to another leaky roof”

Question 20

Blanche’s metaphorical death(critic)

Answer 20

• symbolic of Old south over New south
• power of the working class over the upper class from Marxist theory
• symbolic of victim of the patriarchy from modern feminist lens

Question 21

J.M. McGlinn

Answer 21

[Stanley] wishes to destroy [Blanche’s] composure to make her recognise that she is the same as he is, a sexual animal”

Question 22

Katrina Duerre

Answer 22

[Blanche] attempts to maintain her past luxurious life by holding onto and creating new desires rather than adjusting to her reality”

Question 23

P. Allan

Answer 23

“She craves ‘magic’ because the truth about postwar America is too harsh to bear.”

Question 24

Blanche as classist in the opening

Answer 24

“her expression is one of shocked disbelief” when viewing Elysian fields

Question 25

diversity in Elysian Fields

Answer 25

“New Orleans is a cosmopolitan city where there is a relatively warm and easy intermingling of the races in the old part of town”

Question 26

how does Blanche react to the Varsouviana polka?

Answer 26

“she is drinking to escape it”

Question 27

Blanche during rape scene

Answer 27

“night is filled with inhuman voices like cries in a jungle flame”
Stanley “springs” at Blanche shouting “tiger” (animalistic)

Question 28

Blanche at the end of the play in her most grotesque bridal self?

Answer 28

-wearing a “soiled and crumpled white statin evening gown”
-“murmuring excitedly as if to a group of spectral admirers”

Question 29

Blanche hearing shot, flashback?

Answer 29

“a distant revolver shot is heard, Blanche seems relieved”- Her relief illustrates her lack of vitality as a result of the trauma.

Question 30

Shadows during rape scene?

Answer 30

“shadows are of a grotesque and menacing form”- shadows illustrate the form of society, plastic theatre. Blanche’s worst fears and nightmares are projected onto the wall. Plastic theatre.
Williams is exposing the workings of her vulnerable mind. Expressionist technique.

Question 31

Stage directions (music) due to Mitch’s influence on Blanche

Answer 31

‘The music fades away’- It epitomises how Mitch is moving Blanche towards happiness. She doesn’t need to be lonely any more. She has found a sense of hope.

Question 32

Blanche struggling to uphold ‘old fashioned ideals’ to Mitch (rolling eyes)

Answer 32

‘She rolls her eyes, knowing that he cannot see her face’

Question 33

Paper moon quote

Answer 33

‘It’s only a paper moon…it wouldn’t be make-believe if you believed in me’

Question 34

Blanche’s fantasy

Answer 34

‘Frantically’ ‘Hiding the bottle in a closet crouching the mirror and dabbing her face with cologne and powder’- Sums her up, highlights the facade to her’, the notion she is doing this frantically shows how she is physically getting into another character.

Question 35

Sex corrupting Blanche

Answer 35

‘Stella pours the coke into the glass. It foams over and spills. Blanche gives a piercing cry.’- Creates a crude image of ejaculation. The staining of her white skirt emphasises how sex has corrupted her, her cry is likely a mixture of pleasure and pain.

Question 36

Blanche telling Mitch the truth

Answer 36

“Yes, a big spider. Thats where I bought my victims”

Question 37

Blanche infantilising Stella to manipulate and gain control

Answer 37

‘honey’

Question 38

Blanche’s family history

Answer 38

“French by extraction”
“French Huguenots”