Streetcar - Blanche Flashcards
1
Q
Established as an outcast from the offset of the play, doesn’t fit in with New American setting
A
- “incongruous to the setting”
- “white suit with a fluffy bodice”
- “necklace and ear-rings of pearl”
- “cosmopolitan” / “decaying”
- “if you will excuse me, I’m just about to drop” / “well, that’s where she’s at, watchin’ her husband”
2
Q
Desperate to fit the Southern Belle stereotype
A
- “Laurel” / “Belle Reve”
- “(She pours a half tumbler of whisky and tosses it down. She carefully replaced the bottle and washes out the tumbler at the sink)”
- “innocent” / “delicate”
- “I thought you would never come back to this horrible place!” / “What are you doing in a place like this?”
3
Q
Suppresses her own desire
A
- “Red hots!” / “red stained package”
- “He smashed all the light bulbs with the heel of my slipper! And you-you let him? Didn’t run, didn’t scream?”
- “bathing” / “soak in a hot tub”
- “Rosenkavalier” / “Bow to me first! Now present them.”
- “You should know the line she’s been feeding to Mitch. He thought she had never been more than kissed by a fellow”
- “not clean enough to bring in the house with my mother”
- “the flamingo” / “army camp near Laurel” / “a seventeen-year-old boy- she’d gotten mixed up with!”
- “pressing her lips to his” / “without waiting for him to accept”
4
Q
Forces Mitch to conform to her outdated romantic expectations - review
A
- “Rosenkavalier”
- “Bow to me first! Now present them.”
- “You should know the line she’s been feeding to Mitch. He thought she had never been more than kissed by a fellow”
- “not clean enough to bring in the house with my mother”
5
Q
Blanche’s deception
A
- “I want to deceive him enough to make him- want me…”
- “Without waiting for him to accept, she crosses quickly to him and presses her lips to his.” / “Look who’s coming! My Rosenkavalier!”
- “You should know the line she’s been feeding to Mitch. He thought she had never been more than kissed by a fellow”
- “Well, so much for her being such a refined and particular type of girl.”
- “I don’t tell truth, I tell what ought to be truth. And if that is sinful, then let me be damned for it!–Don’t turn the light on!”
- “But I was a fool enough to believe you was straight.” / “You lied to me Blanche.”
- “I received a telegram from an old admirer of mine.” / “A cruise of the Caribbean on a yacht!”
- “There isn’t no millionaire! And Mitch didn’t come back; with roses ‘cause I know where he is-“
6
Q
Threat she presents to Stanley
A
- “What such a man has to offer is animal force and he gave a wonderful exhibition of that! But the only way to live with such a man is to-go to bed with him! And that’s your job- not mine!”
- “There’s something downright- bestial- about him!”
- “The first time I laid eyes on him I thought to myself, that man is my executioner! That man will destroy me”
- “You should know the line she’s been feeding to Mitch. He thought she had never been more than kissed by a fellow”
- “I’ve been on to you from the start! Not once did you pull any wool over this boy’s eyes!”
- “Come to think of it- maybe you wouldn’t be bad to- interfere with…”
- “All right, let’s have some rough-house!” / “We’ve had this date with each other from the beginning!”
7
Q
Blanche as a tragic figure
A
- “Nobody was tender and trusting as she as. But people like you abused her, and forced her to change.”
- “I thanked God for you, because you seemed to be gentle–a cleft in the rock of the world that I could hide in! But I guess I was asking, hoping–too much!”
- “I don’t think I want to marry you any more.” / “You’re not clean enough to bring in the house with my mother.”
- Shep Huntleigh
- “Come to think of it- maybe you wouldn’t be bad to- interfere with…”
- “All right, let’s have some rough-house!” / “We’ve had this date with each other from the beginning!”
- “Lurid reflections appear on the walls in odd, sinuous shapes. The ‘Varsouviana’ is filtered into a weird distortion, accompanied by the cries and noises of the jungle.”
- “Whoever you are- I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.”
