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Texts: A Streetcar Named Desire (Complete) The Penelopiad (Complete) The World's Wife (In Progress) Information included: Author General Summary Themes Authorial techniques Conflicts Characters Rising Action Climax Falling Action
A Streetcar Named Desire
drama written by Tennessee Williams
published in 1947
Genre: Southern Gothic
Context: post-WWII; industrialisation; emergence of working class; decline of aristocracy
Mood/tone: starts off carefree/happy and gradually becomes more serious
Tennesse Williams
Had a sister who had mental issues
Was a homosexual
Had an addiction to sleeping pills and liquor
General Summary of ASCND
Tennessee Williams' 1947 drama, A Streetcar Named Desire, tells the tale of Blanche, a Southern aristocrat who travels to New Orleans in the 1940s to visit her sister, Stella.
She becomes increasingly more delusional as a result of her oppression by men, which only worsens following her rape by her abusive brother-in-law, Stanley, and is ultimately sent to a mental asylum by her own sister.
ASCND — Themes
Appearances
Class/Status
Death
Decline of the Aristocracy
Desire
Dependence on men
Emergence of the working class
Fantasy vs Reality
Female Oppression
Loneliness
Love & Marriage
Masculinity
Mental health
Role of women
Violence
Wealth
Youth & Beauty
ASCND — Authorial Techniques
Allusions
Anaphora
Foreshadowing
Imagery
Irony
Metaphor
Motifs
Plastic Theatre
Simile
Stage directions
Symbolism
ASCND — Conflicts
Stanley vs Blanche:
mainly based on the importance they place on class/money
culminates into Blanche’s rape
Stanley vs Stella:
he abuses her, but she stays with him → their relationship is based on passion
they have several arguments about Blanche
Stella vs Blanche:
Blanche and Stella have a disagreement about Stanley: Blanche sees him as a commoner and wants Stella to leave him after she discovers that he is abusive
Blanche vs Mitch:
Mitch breaks up with Blanche after finding out about her promiscuous past, they have an argument about it
ASCND — Characterisation — Blanche (protagonist)
Blanche is a complex character who prefers to live in delusion instead of facing the harsh reality of her life.
She is surrounded by death:
She blames herself for her husband’s suicide.
She was the one who took care of her dying family members and buried the rest of her family.
She is delusional about her entire situation of having lost her home, Belle Reve, the loss of her reputation, and her job as a teacher:
believes that she is still rich/a Southern Belle; seen through her haughty actions
criticizes Stella’s home and her husband for being simple
hides her age from other people/pretends to be younger than she actually is
continues to act promiscuously/flirtatiously with different men: Stanley, Mitch, the newspaper boy
her actions with the newspaper boy shows how she has not learned from the past as she had gotten fired for having had an affair with a 17 year old
tries to escape her reality through alcohol
She is dependent on male sexual admiration for her sense of self-esteem, as it reminds her of her youth, which is another reason as to why she acts flirtatiously with many of the male characters.
ASCND — Characterisation — Stanley (antagonist)
He is the actual definition of machoism/masculinity.
extremely aggressive and passionate
plays poker with the boys
has a very dominant and controlling nature
He has both an inferiority and superiority complex:
Inferiority → this stems from his status in society as he is part of the working class; he feels inferior to Stella, and especially, Blanche, who keeps on showing off her status
he is also insecure about his Polish ancestry which he makes up for by being overly patriotic
Superiority → comes from the fact that he is a man and is the dominating figure in his relationship with Stella and ends up dominating over Blanche
He is a foil to Stella, a very feminine, soft character.
ASCND — Characterisations — Stella
Just like her sister, she is dependent on men to give her a place in society:
She is afraid to leave Stanley, who abuses her, despite being pregnant, as she does not know she will do. Instead she prefers to make compromises with him.
Stella is young and pregnant by Stanley Kowalski at the start of the play. She’s also a realist who fears her life will be ruined in case she leaves her husband. Impulsive in nature, she fights with her sister but compromises with her husband after the abuse immediately. In fact, their husband-wife relationship is based on physical passions instead of an idealistic outlook, unlike her sister. Although her love for her sister stays, she does not accept her mentally poor state to continue and lets the doctor take her to asylum.att
ASCND — Characterisations — Mitch
A clumsy, sensitive, and kind man, he is different from the rest of the overly masculine men (especially compared to Stanley) and is a foil to Blanche’s character.
He is less educated, less ‘refined‘, from a working class, naive and innocent
He serves as Blanche’s love interest, though he is mainly interested in her as he wants to get married before his mom passes away. (ie. this would have been an opportunistic marriage on both ends)
He represents Blanche’s chance for happiness in a conventional life and, with Stella, seems like the only other person to regret sending her to the mental asylum.
However, although he is a better man compared to Stanley, he is still driven by desire and tries to have sex with Blanche after they break up.
ASCND — Characterisations — Eunice
She is a supporting character who shows the reality of what living in Elysian Fields is like, contrasting with Blanche’s idealised version of the world.
Eunice approaches her struggles head-on and deals with them efficiently and practically. Eunice understands how their community functions and she acts as a mediator between Stella, Blanche, and Stanley.
When the men’s poker night gets out of control, Eunice is the one to take in Blanche and Stella without question while Stanley cools off.
She is the one who helps Stella send off Blanche to the mental asylum while remaining compassionate, but firm, while Stella is overwhelmed.
She believes male companionship is a woman’s anchor in society.
By assuring Stella that she doesn’t have to believe Stanley raped Blanche, Eunice in effect enables Stanley’s inexcusable act and argues that marriage is a woman’s means of survival.
Given what the audience sees Eunice suffer at the hands of her husband, it is unlikely that she believes nothing of Blanche’s story. However, acknowledging its truth would require her to acknowledge her own husband’s abuse, and it would interfere with her own survival.
ASCND — Rising Action
Blanche starts to despise Stanley when she sees him drunkenly beat her pregnant sister.
Stanley starts to despisee Blanche after he overhears her trying to convince Stella to leave Stanley because he is part of the working class.
Already suspicious of Blanche's act of superiority, Stanley researches Blanche's past. He reports his findings to Blanche's suitor, Mitch, dissuading Mitch from marrying Blanche.
ASCND — Climax
After Stanley treats Blanche cruelly during her birthday dinner, giving her a bus ticket back to Laurel as a present, Stella goes into labor.
She and Stanley depart for the hospital, leaving Blanche alone in the house. Mitch arrives, drunk, and breaks off his relationship with Blanche.
Blanche, alone in the apartment once more, drowns herself in alcohol and dreams of an impossible rescue. Stanley returns to the apartment from the hospital and rapes Blanche.
ASCND — Falling Action
Weeks after the rape, Stella secretly prepares for Blanche's departure to an insane asylum. She tells her neighbor Eunice that she simply couldn't believe Blanche's accusation that Stanley raped her.
Unaware of reality, Blanche boasts that she is leaving to join a millionaire suitor. When the doctor arrives, Blanche leaves after a minor struggle, and only Stella and Mitch, who sits in the kitchen with Stanley's poker players, seem to express real remorse for her.
The Penelopiad
feminist reconstruction in the form of a novella written by Margaret Atwood
published in 2005
Genre: parallel novel/pastiche/historical fiction
Context: told from the Underworld, takes Penelope and the Maids’ perspective of Odysseus’ travels and what happened in the kingdom during that time
Mood/tone: casual/matter-of-fact; violent and angry (from the Maids perspective)
Margaret Atwood
has written several texts focused on feminist reconstruction
feminist, concerned about:
women's situation in society
female oppression & the discrimination they face
women’s “otherness“ in a male dominated society
women’s basic freedom is ignored by society due to it being patriarchal
General Summary of TP
Margaret Atwood’s 2005 feminist reconstruction, The Penelopiad, is a retelling of The Illiad from Penelope and the Twelve Maids’ perspective.
While Penelope’s version of events presents her as a more important character in the story, while the Maids’ presents them as innocent victims bent on revenge.
TP — Themes
Class/Status
Female Oppression
Loneliness
Love and Marriage
Motherhood
Nature of Perspective
Power
Role of Women
Storytelling
Subjectivity of Justice
Subjectivty of truth
Violence
Youth & Beauty
TP — Authorial Techniques
Allusion to Greek Mythology
Anaphora
Direct Address
Dual narration
Imagery
Metaphors
Motifs
Parallelism
Personification
Rhyme scheme
Simile
Symbolism
TP — Conflicts
Penelope vs The Maids:
Two distinct versions of the story which conflict with one another
Odyssey vs the Suitors vs the Maids:
He kills them — importance: the Maids are innocent based on their version of accounts
TP — Characterisations — Penelope (protagonist)
She is an unreliable narrator.
her story is full of biases and conflicts with the Maids
she does not know everything about what happened
tries to paint herself in a positive light, but her faithfullness is questioned based on her version and the one of the Maids
Although by telling her story, she is asserting herself a bit more by showing her intelligence and cunning and the role she played in the events, but she also victimizes herself.
She is turns against women to protect herself:
does not protect the Maids from Odysseus nor does she tell him what they were really doing for her
wants the Maids to leave Odysseus alone in the Underworld
makes herself the victim in every conversation with Helen of Troy (motivated by jealousy)
TP — Characterisations — The Twelve Maids
They provide their perspective on the events happening in Ithaca - often highlighting the struggles of women of different classes or contradicting Penelope’s version of events.
Their purpose is to demonstrate Penelope’s unreliability as a narrator.
They are more symbolic characters as only one of them has a name and they only appear in the chorus. They are symbols of female oppression.
Their lives and their fate show how little women are valued, as their deaths go unpunished and largely unnoticed.
they show that the oppression of women is not an abstract concept, but has actual consequences:
shown through their haunting of Odysseus
TP — Characterisations — Odysseus
He keeps the same qualities that he is associated with — strength and cleverness. However, Penelope shows how he uses them, taking away from his heroic character:
His cleverness — used to cheat his way into marrying Penelope + to try to deceive his way out of fighting in the Trojan War.
His deception/skilled storytelling — call into question his stories and his time away from Ithaca (was he really held up by Poseidon or was he actually having affairs?)
His actions are also questioned in this version of the story:
In the original myth, the killing of the suitors and of the maids is considered to be heroic → in the novella, Penelope’s version casts doubt as to whether it was really justified
Overall, his character emphasizes the subjectivity of storytelling.
TP — Characterisations — Helen of Troy
She is demonized by Penelope for her beauty and vanity.
While Helen does act insulting and condescending in Penelope’s version of events, Penelope’s sense of reality has been proven to be warped at times, calling into question what Helen is actually like.
highlights Penelope’s unreliability
She is the villain in Penelope’s story.
She is blamed for Odysseus having gone to war.
TP — Rising Action
Odysseus leaving for the Trojan War, leaving Penelope alone to lead the kingdom.
This includes Penelope’s actions in keeping the Suitors at bay.
TP — Climax
Odysseus killing the Suitors and the Maids, thus freeing his kingdom and reasserting his power.
TP — Falling Action
Odysseus is cursed by the Maids and haunted by them for eternity.
Penelope remains in the Fields of Asphodel, waiting for her husband to return.
This shows how even in death, her life has not changed.
The World’s Wife
Carol Ann Duffy
General Summary — TWW
General Summary — Medusa
General Summary — Mrs Midas
General Summary — Mrs Quasimodo
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