Streetcar - Class and division Flashcards
Division at beginning of the play
Setting
‘L and N tracks’
‘Two-storey building’
The building contains ‘two flats, upstairs and down.’
Quite to show Blanche is educated
‘Only Poe! Only Mr Edgar Allan Poe!’
Belittling Stella
Context
The old ways of the southern cotton fields were fading, whilst the American dream resulted in the working-class achieving more respect and equality.
What was Williams inspired by (multicultural)
His own time in the French quarters of the new Orleans; a culturally diverse place
Stanleys polish ancestry…
Stanley’s Polish ancestry make some part of the new diverse post-World War II America
Old South Vs New South
Stanley represents the new America whilst Blanche represents the old Southern aristocracy
Blanche’s fate against Stanley can be represents the decline of aristocratic families traditionally associate with the South at the cost of the rise of the new South.
Old south refers to aristocracy, land of plantations and slave owners
What does Blanche represent?
Similarly to Amanda Wingfield in Williams’ other play ‘The Glass Menagerie’, Blanche represents a faded Southern Belle.
Characteristics of a southern belle
Reliant on steady income from cotton plantation utilising slave labour
Perfect southern bella married, fulfilled husbands needs and reproduced
Blanche about Stanley
‘He’s common’
Blanche southern belle
‘I love to be waited on’
Maybe:
‘Bow to me first!’ - to Mitch
‘She curtsies low’
Quotes when Mitch and Blanche get back from date to suggest they are outsiders
‘Outer wall’
‘Upside down plastic statue’
Blanche playing the role of a southern belle when Mitch flirts with her
What is page 63 about ??
‘Unhand me sir’
‘No reason why you shouldn’t behave like a gentlemen’
‘I have old fashioned ideals’
Her voice sounds ‘gently reproving’ (means expressing blame/disapproval)
No privacy in the apartment
Portières
Stanley underwear
Bathroom door
Commonness
‘Portières between the two rooms’
‘Stalks through the bedroom in his underwear’
‘I have to ask him to close the bathroom door’
‘That sort of commonness isn’t necessary’
Stanley disliking the way Stella does everything for Blanche
‘Run and get her cokes’
‘Serve ‘em to her majesty in the tub’
Contemporary vs modern perspective when Blanche is in the bathroom and Stanley yells at her to get out
Modern - disrespectful of Stanley, too brutal
Contemporary - sympathise with Stanley; he is the man of the house
Stanley taking Stella off the pedestal
‘I pulled you down off them columns’
And Stella ‘loved it’
Stanley about him being common
‘I was common as dirt’
‘Wasn’t we happy together’
Blanche playing the role of a southern belle when Mitch comes to see her at the end of the play
Blanche criticises Mitch
The treatment she received from him was ‘uncavalier’ (language of the southern belle)
‘Uncouth apparel’
‘You haven’t even shaved’ - ‘unforgivable insult’ to a ‘lady’
Prostitue Blanche évidence
‘Many intimacies with strangers’
Blanche retaining her southern belle status right until the very end
???
‘Very very rich woman!’
‘Beauty of mind, richness of spirit tenderness of the heart’
I have ‘all’ those things
‘Casting my pearls before swine’
How is the sudden change in timings in scene 11 used to reinforce Blanche is not believed about the rape ?
The sudden change from consecutive timings of the other scenes to when scene 11 begins with ‘it is some weeks later’ not only makes the audience feel a similar confusion to how Blanche also feels, it is also a structural device used whereby the absence of words further diminishes Blanche’s rape accusation and also reflects the fact that women had no voice at this time in America. Her accusation is not believed.
Blanche mocking Stella’s home and Stella’s reaction
‘two rooms’
Two is in italics
Stella - ‘she is embarrassed’
