Streetcar - The Tragic Heroine Flashcards
Blanche’s fight is a tragic struggle to maintain a dying culture
Blanche’s deception is not by fault of her own, but stems from an upbringing that stressed the importance of an unattainable standard
- “innocent” / “delicate”
- “Red hots!” / “red stained package”
- “(She pours a half tumbler of whisky and tosses it down. She carefully replaced the bottle and washes out the tumbler at the sink)”
- “bathing” / “soak in a hot tub”
- “(A locomotive is heard approaching outside. She claps her hands to her ears and crouches over.)”
She finds comfort and connection with Mitch, however their relationship was fated to fail as Blanche’s involuntarily repression of desire is deceptive within their relationship, exposed by Stanley
- “old-fashioned ideals”
- “natural gentleman”
- “Rosenkavalier”
- “Bow to me first” / “he does so”
- “You need somebody. And I need somebody too. Could it be- you and me, Blanche?”
- “I wouldn’t be expecting Mitch over tonight.” / “Well, he’s not going to marry her. Maybe he was, but he’s not going to jump in a tank with a school of sharks now!”
Her demise comes as a result of the brutal force of Stanley, who sees it as his mission to destroy Blanche and ensure his ideology is dominant
- “The Kowalskis and the DuBois have different notions”
- “The first time I laid eyes on him I thought to myself, that man is my executioner! That man will destroy me”
- “I’ve been on to you from the start! Not once did you pull any wool over this boy’s eyes!”
- “Just to make sure I bought her ticket myself. A bus ticket!” / “Her future is mapped out for her.”
- “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!”
Blanche’s demise is deserved and her wrongdoing is irredeemable
Blanche is a deceptive figure who hides her own destructive desire behind a false identity of the Southern Belle
Tries to maintain “innocent and delicate” appearance
- “incongruous to the setting”/ “white suit with a fluffy bodice” / “necklace and ear-rings of pearl”
- “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”
This repression is deceptive however, she hides her past wrongdoing that came as a result of desire and attempts to present herself as pure, aware of her own deception
- “I know I fib a good deal. After all, a woman’s charm is fifty percent illusion”
- “Without waiting for him to accept, she crosses quickly to him and presses her lips to his.” / “Look who’s coming! My 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”
- “Well, so much for her being such a refined and particular type of girl.”
- “the flamingo” / “army camp near Laurel” / “a seventeen-year-old boy- she’d gotten mixed up with!”
- “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!”
She therefore facilitates her own demise, hiding her true self and positioning herself directly against Stanley, who views it as his mission to maintain the dominance of New American ideologies
- “The first time I laid eyes on him I thought to myself, that man is my executioner! That man will destroy me”
- “The Kowalskis and the DuBois have different notions”
- “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!”
