Williams' intentions Flashcards
key concern #1: genre
may be plausible to argue one of Williams’ main intentions when writing Streetcar was to extend and innovate the genre of drama further in the same way many of his contemporaries, such as Arthur Miller, were doing. a new form of tragedy was emerging: the 1940s American tragedy that focused on ‘the common man’, or characters unconventional to classic tragedy (e.g. Blanche as a woman).
his invention of plastic theatre also helped to establish his identity as a new playwright, celebrating the union between realism and expressionism that had previously been kept strictly separate.
key concern #2: art
may be plausible to argue one of Williams’ main intentions was to highlight the value of the creative, the theatrical and the magical. through the medium of theatre, where many theatregoers may already be sympathetic to this cause, Williams’ emphasises the richness of theatricality that seemed to be losing value in a contemporary, philistine post-war society (Lavender Scare).
Blanche is one of the prime movers in control of this theatricality through her associations with light and music; her absence leaves the audience at the end without her ‘magic’.
key concern #3: the delicate and vulnerable
may be plausible to argue one of Williams’ main concerns was to present the crushing of the delicate and vulnerable in contemporary society as a tragedy of modern times. this idea is very much outlined in his 1942 poem ‘Lament for the Moths’. While there is some celebration of the freedom of New Orleans, where Williams, as a bohemian artist, lived for the majority of his life, there is a distinct sorrow towards the loss of traditions, manners, and ‘Southern hospitality’ of the American South from where he originated. There is a marked romanticism of the past, perhaps similar to the way in which we ourselves may look back on aspects of our own childhoods fondly even if the present can offer us more.
