Social Class/ Outsiders

‘Her appearance is incongrous to the setting’

• New Orleans is a cultural melting pot in order to emphasize Blanche’s outsider status

• She is unable to understand the decay of her Southern Belle status in a new society.

• Reversal of roles- the upper class woman is ostracised as opposed to the lower-classes who have accepted upward social mobility.

‘Bowling Jacket’

• Plastic theatre/ expressionist use of Costume to characterise Stanley as the emblem of Capitalism with its competitive and harsh rules.

‘He’s common!’

• Williams truly exposes Blanche’s outdated mindset and true colours. Her real concern here is for Stanley’s social status, rather than her superficial concern for Stella’s safety.

• Blanche becomes a social outcast because she refuses to conform to conventional moral values.

‘Next door to glass’

• This quote highlights the economic cultural differences between Stella and Stanley, his ignorance to jewellery and Stella’s knowledge on luxuries.

• Suggests that Blanche’s southern belle grandeur and upper-class privilege is artificial, and has no real value.

‘The Kowalski’s and Dubois have different notions’

• Encapsulates the play’s key oppositions and conflict: New South versus Old South values.

• highlights how the 2 cannot co-exist, and perhaps this is why Blanche is cast out from society- her outdated values cause her to be ostracized, which is necessary for the changing to be fully made.

‘Big, capable hands!’

• Act of transferring the rest of the papers of Belle Reve into Stanley’s hand is symbolic of the transition into the New America

• Blanche’s satirical tone highlights how in both differing societies, Women will always be treated as outsiders and suppressed by the ‘big capable hands’ of the Patriarchy.

‘Maybe he’s what we need to mix our blood with’

• optimistic view on the integration of the Old South into the changing world of New America- contamination of old south values

• momentary scene of hope.

‘Survivor of the Stone age!’ & ‘ape-like’

• Stanley is always described in conjunction with animalistic and primitive imagery/ language, Williams wants to highlight the strength of the New America and its competitve nature

• Darwin’s theory of Survival of the fittest- foreshadows Stanley’s victory of Blanche at the end of the play.

• ‘ape-like’ ‘sub-human’ suggests he hasn’t evolved properly- Blanche’s inability to accept new society values.

‘I pulled you down off them columns and how you loved it, getting them coloured lights going’

• Stanley’s dominance over Stella through sex- He pulled her down from a high social position in Belle Reve to his working-class level.

• Metaphor of ‘coloured lights’ conveys the intense passion in their marriage, a world of colour and vitality unlike Blanche’s pastel life.

‘‘Every man is a king!'“

• The allusion to Huey Long shows the need for Stanley to assert his intellectual dominance, it shows how the home is his only place where he is not an outsider

• As an immigrant and working-class man, he knew he was subordinate in society (an outsider) so the apartment is where he is superior.

‘But what I am is 100% American’

• Ironic because there is no such thing as ‘100% American’

• attempts to overcome his outsider status, he is fixated on attaining the American Dream

• Stanley’s hatred for Blanche is fuelled by the fact she will always dismiss and treat him as ‘common’

‘Hey, Canary Bird! Toots! Get OUT of the BATHROOM!’

• Walls of the Kowalski apartment are a metaphor for the warzones of power and social class

• Stanley’s ‘territorial’ brood is seen through his verbal dominance- interfereing her sacred space in the bathroom, symbolic of the fast encroaching of the New South onto the Old South.

‘[The view through the window is fading into a still-golden dusk]’

• transitional time, plastic theatre indicates Blanche’s state of mind, she is ‘fading’ along with the old Southern world

• ‘Dusk’ is the transition into night time, symbolic of the death of the glory of the old south

‘[A torch of sunlight blazes on the side of a big water tank or oil-drum’

• industrial aspects refer to the future ‘blaze’ has connotations of obliteration of the past and Stanley’s power.

Stanley + The train:

• Shows his control over the setting and how he belongs in that setting, whereas Blanche is ‘incongrous to the setting’

Transition from Bowling shirt to ‘Brilliant silk bowling shirt’

• growth of capitalism and the strength Stanley assumes as the play goes on.

‘Take at Salerno, I believed I was lucky’ & ‘[No sound but of Stanley shuffling his cards]’

• Stanley’s immaturity- he’s still playing a game and this highlights how Capitalism is cruel and competitive.

• Battle of Salerno- a great victory for American soldiers, he uses it as a metaphor for his victory over Blanche.

‘Would be so lecherous…if he had means to be so’

• lower-class plight, this is a reference to Bosola’s social status and how his success’ in court are limited by the resources around him

• Juxtaposition to Stanley due to the rise of capitalism, meaning every man had social-mobility and was no longer bound to social status. American Dream.

‘Whose throat must I cut’

• Violence and corruption is normalised into the court, reflects how Bosola is an outsider and so gets his hands dirty in order to gain status.