A Streetcar named Desire by Tennessee Williams

Synopsis:

This is a play by Tennessee Williams that takes place in New Orleans. It is about Blanche Du Bois, a former southern belle. After losing her job as a high school English teacher, and her luxurious plantation home, Belle Reve, Blanche moves in a seedy apartment in New Orleans with her younger sister, Stella, and brother-in-law Stanley.

Blanche is very talkative and fragile and demure and was previously married, but her husband committed suicide. She tells Stella she has left her teaching job because of her nerves; however, she was fired due to being involved with one of her students and being involved with prostitutes.

Stanley Kowalski is the husband of Stella and is working class. He is very cruel and critical of Blanche and is passionate towards Stella, but can also be verbally and physically abusive towards her is and domineering and controlling and is an alcoholic.

Stella is Stanley’s wife and Blanche’s sister and is torn between her sister and husband and is pregnant with their first child.

Mitch is Stanley’s army friend, co worker and poker buddy, and starts to court Blanche, but after he learns the truth about her, is no longer interested in her and rejects her.

Blanche tries to encourage Stella to leave Stanley due to his controlling tendencies; however, Stella tells Blanche she is happy with Stanley, and has no desire to leave him. Stanley rapes Blanche, and Blanche tells Stella, but Stella does not believe her. After Blanche has a mental breakdown, a doctor arrives and takes her to a mental institution. Stella feels guilty about sending her sister away, but is loyal to her husband and stays with him, and has a newborn child.

Review:

I very much enjoyed this play and found it be very captivating and entertaining.

“What you are talking about is brutal desire- just desire-the name of that rattle-trap street-car that bangs through the Quarter, up one narrow street and down another.”

“Physical beauty is passing, a transitory possession. But beauty of the mind and richness of the spirit and tenderness of the heart aren’t taken way, but grow.”

“Deliberate cruelty is not forgivable. It is the one unforgivable thing in my opinion and it is the one thing of which I have never, never been guilty.”