Character of Blanche in Tennessee Williams A Streetcar Named Desire Es

Character of Blanche in Tennessee Williams A Streetcar Named DesireOne of the best-known plays of our time, Tennessee Williamss A Streetcar Named Desire tells the narrative of fading Southern belle Blanche DuBois and her struggles during the Souths post-war changes. Although the play is widely remembered due to its 1951 film version and Marlon Brandos famous bare-chested cry of Stella, it is also a narrative of a changing South containing characters struggling with the loss of aristocracy to the new American immigrant, the fallout of chivalry to a new mindset of sex and desire, and a woman grasping desperately at the last bit of fantasy she can muster. Throughout A Streetcar Named Desire, Williams uses Blanche as a way to refresh Southern improvement by using her as a symbol for a dark, underlying existence. When fading Southern belle Blanche Dubois first arrives at her sister Stellas apartment, she is already internally dealing with the struggle between desire and gentilit y. The end of the play is foreshadowed early on as Blanche states, They told me to take a street-car named Desire, and then delegate to one called Cemeteries and ride six blocks and get off at Elysian Fields (15). This statement assists as a metaphor for Blanches life as the mentions of desire, cemeteries, and the Elysian Fields (which symbolize the land of the dead in Greek mythology) describe how her sexual desire serves as the catalyst for her social death and expulsion. Blanches vanity and dependence on men also culminate as the play nears its end, as she is taken away from the fantasy she so desperately clings to and dragged into a new founding of reality and a New South. Blanches struggle with fantasy and reality serves as on... ... in everyones lives. This statement holds true for progress as well without fantasy and dreams there would be no progress. After all, progress is the product of someones fantasy- an idea that was thought up on a whim. Like Blanche though, progress often has an underlying existence that is very dark. Not all progress is good and Blanche symbolizes this. Williamss comparisons between Blanche and progress serve to show how progress can be a force that precipitates each individuals desperate choices that is, their ability to throw ideas, love, etc. out into the world in the hopes of moving forward. By unveiling a theme that is still pertinent today, A Streetcar Named Desire makes its mark as a musical composition of classic literature, which will be read for generations to come. Works CitedWilliams, Tennessee. A Streetcar Named Desire. New York Signet Printing, 1980.