Streetcar Critics Flashcards
Samuel Tapp
Blanche DuBois is a victim of the mythology of a Southern Belle.
Elia Kazan
Blanche is dangerous, she is destructive. Blanche was an unstable woman who has entered and threatened the security of a different world, and who was finally cast out allowing that world to survive.
Tennessee Williams
One major theme for my work is the destructive power of society on the sensitive non-conformist individual.
Kathleen Lart
On the other hand, the play presents Blanche as a tragic figure and Stanley as an agent of her destruction.
Eric Bentley
Eric Bentley sees the play as a clash of species.
Ruth Foley
Stella Kowalski represents a more classic example of a female victim in a patriarchal society where a woman accepts spousal abuse in order to be provided for and deludes herself into thinking that she is happy in this role.
Nicola Onyett (clash)
The brutal culture clash between the blue-collar worker and the aristocratic intellectual is located in their struggle over Stella.
Nicola Onyett (Stella)
Stella’s decision to stay with the father of her child and allow her sister to be committed to a mental asylum may symbolise the shifting social power structures of the new USA.
Feminist Critic
A Feminist critic would sympathise with the women in this play as they are all victims of powerful men. They would also feel disappointed by the fact that Blanche was challenging Stanley but her own desires and delusions caused her to lose the battle.
Marxist Critic
A Marxist critic would feel satisfied that Stanley is triumphant in the end over Blanche, that he won the power struggle. Symbolically he has represented the North defeating the South, which Blanche is symbolic of.
