SND - positive and negative qualities Flashcards
How to write the introduction?
‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ is a play written by Tennessee Williams. It involves our protagonist Blanche, who visits her sister Stella and her new brother-in-law Stanley in New Orleans over the summer period. Blanche is a very complex character and the audience can see that she has a plentiful mix of negative and positive qualities, which begins to seriously affect her throughout the play and this is explored through the use of language and word choice.
Blanche: ‘Stella, you have a maid, don’t you?’
emphasises that blanche is of a higher class.
she thinks that she is better than others because of her upbringing.
makes it sound like its odd for Stella to not have a made because when growing up they had one.
highlights that Blanche looks down on Stella for the life she settled for, for example with her ‘common’ husband, Stanley.
Blanche: ‘He acts like an animal, has an animals habits! Eats like one, moves like one, talks like one… something ape-like about him’
imagery - ‘like an animal’ conveys how Stanley seems to be a completely different species to her and Stella.
she only wants the best for her sister, by telling her that she deserves better than him.
She does insult Stanley, but in her perspective she only thinks she’s doing good for Stella.
She can be rude, but she’s doing it only to show the people she loves that they are worth a lot more than they settle themselves for.
Blanche: ‘I can’t stand a naked lightbulb anymore than I can stand a rude remark’
its clear blanche is in denial of her age - she cannot stand the truth.
‘naked lightbulb’ - word choice - suggests she refuses to to go anywhere brightly lit like sunlight in the afternoon, this highlights how stubborn she is.
compares it to something she has no tolerance for to emphasise further how she feels - highlights how delusional she is.
she is afraid of people seeing what she truly looks like.
Blanche: ‘I don’t tell the truth. I tell what ought to be the truth’
she bends the truth to make the situation appear better.
emphasises that Blanche ‘never lies to people’ as in her mind they are correct and it must be the truth.
highlights how blanche cannot face the truth, instead she lives inside a world of delusion to make life seem more stable.
Stage Direction, Blanche is ‘murmuring excitedly as if to a group of spectral admirers’
‘spectral’ - word choice - connotations of ghost-like, suggests the people that blanche is talking to are not really there and that she is getting ready for an imaginary event.
these hallucinations are a result of deteriorating mental health which the audience has seem from Scene 1.
