Scene One Flashcards
Summary
- One evening in May 1947, Eunice is talking to a neighbour outside her home in the ironically named Elysian Fields, a shabby street in a poor district of New Orleans. Stanley Kowalski and Mitch arrive, on their way to go bowling. Stanley throws his wife, Stella, a meat package.
- Blanche DuBois arrives, looking for her sister Stella’s apartment. As Eunice and her husband Steve own the apartment, Eunice is able to let Blanche in.
- Blanche nervously helps herself to a drink while Eunice fetches Stella.
- When Stella arrives, the sisters embrace, but there is clearly an undercurrent of tension. Blanche is critical of the apartment, and then admits the loss of the family home, Belle Reve.
- Stanley greets Blanche pleasantly but there is an uneasy atmosphere. Blanche tells him about the death of her husband some years ago.
“A gentle woman about twenty-five, and of the background obviously quite different from…….
………her husbands.”
“He heaves a package at her. She cries out in protest but……
…….manages to catch it.”
“Her appearance is incongruous to…..
………the setting.”
“She is daintily dressed in a white suit with a fluffy bodice, necklace and ear - rings of pearl, white gloves and hat, looking as if……
…….she was arriving at a summer tea or cocktail party.”
“Her delicate beauty must avoid…….
……strong light.”
“When he’s away for a week I nearly go wild, and when he comes back I cry on his…..
……lap like a baby.”
“You’ve put on some weight, yes, you’re just as plump as a…..
……little partridge.”
“All of those deaths! The long…..
…….parade to the graveyard! Father, mother! Margaret, that dreadful way!”
“Liquor goes fast in……
……hot weather.”
(About the liquor)
Stanley; “Have a shot?”
Blanche; “No, I - rarely touch it.”
Stanley - “Some people rarely touch it, but……
……it touches them often.”
“He sizes women up at a glance, with sexual classifications, crude images flashing into his mind and determining the way……
…..he smiles at them.”
“Everything that is his, that bears his emblem of the…….
…….gaudy seed-bearer.”
“The loss……
…….the loss.”
Stella; “They’re Stanley’s friends.”
Blanche; “Polacks?”
Stella; “They’re a……
…….mixed lot Blanche.”
Blanche; “Is he so different?”
Stella; “Yes…….
……..A different species.”
“I know you must have some liquor on the place! Where could it be, I wonder?………
……..Oh, I spy, I spy!”
Stage Directions - “Blanche sits in a chair very stiffly with her shoulders slightly hunched, her legs…….
…….pressed close together, and her hands tightly clutching her purse as if she were quite cold.”
Stage Directions - “She pours herself half a tumbler of whisky and…….
…….tosses it down.”
Eunice: “Stella spoke of you”
Blanche: “Yes?”
Eunice: “She said you taught in a school.”…….
Blanche: “Yes.”
Eunice: “And you’re from Mississippi, huh?”
Blanche: “Yes.”
“Stella, oh Stella, Stella! Stella for…..
……Star!”
“Now don’t get worried, your sister hasn’t turned into a….
…..drunkard, she’s just all shaken up and hot and tired and dirty.”
Blanche: “Why didn’t you tell me, why didn’t you write me, honey, why didn’t you let me know?”…….
…….Stella: “Tell you what, Blanche?”
Blanche: “Why, that you had to live in these conditions!”
“New Orleans isn’t like…..
……other cities.”
