essay: violence n cruelty

p1 » Streetcar: Blanche is a sexual object, a ‘Southern Comfort,’ to the men, who employ absolute physical agency over her

• Blanche: “I said unhand me, sir” (sc6, pg63)

• “here’s something Southern Comfort!” (sc9, pg85)

• [Stanley] picks up her inert figure (sc10, pg97)

p2 » Beautiful: cruelty towards Marilyn, via exploitation

• “she slept in an eye-mask, naked/drugged”

• “she couldn’t die when she died”

• “the smoking cop who watched…the dark roots of her pubic hair”

p3 » Streetcar: Blanche is cruelly not heard or listened to = admitted to mental hospital by the end

• “…but I’m not going to put up at a hotel…I can’t be alone!” (sc1, pg10)

  • assumes that Stella is about to suggest this

• “I ought to go there on a rocket that never comes down” (sc2, pg25)

• “I have always depended on the kindness of strangers” (sc11, pg107)

  • her loved ones have repeatedly failed her

p4 » Loud: women not heard/listened to » cruelty in ignorance

• “one day her voice ripped out of her throat/like a firework

• “each vast wing a shriek”

• “she bawled at the moon and it span away”