Zusammenfassung der Ressource
the glass menagerie
- THEME: TRUE ESCAPE IS IMPOSSIBLE
- ILLUSION AS A FORM OF ESCAPE
- not taking steps to change reality, but offer reprise from the suffering
- TOM
- SYMBOL: Fire Escape
- He starts off at the fire escape, foreshadowing his ultimate escape from the family. (Pg 4)
- Laura slips on the fire escape, in Scene Four (Pg 29)
- Doesn't escape in the end, stuck in poverty and crushed in reality
- symbolises Illusion of (cos he truly escape in the end) Escape/Freedom
- (evidence) Pg 3 - Name is a touch of accidental poetic truth
- physical separation from the rest of the house
- Steps away from Amanda's chastising (Pg 39/59)
- escape from Amanda
- TOM LEAVES THE FAMILY THROUGH THE FIRE ESCAPE
- SEEKS FREEDOM
- REALITY: Familial responsibilities tie Tom down
- SYMBOL: COFFIN (Pg 27)
- job and responsibilities
- Suffocating, slowly killing him while he struggles for room to breath and be free
- "But who in hell ever got himself out of one without removing one nail" (Pg 27)
- Must struggle to leave the coffin
- "But the wonderfullest trick of all was the coffin trick." (Pg 27)
- He marvelled at the man who could leave his coffin without struggling
- "You think I want to spend fifty-five years down there in that - celotext interior!" (Pg 23)
- The lights will go because he paid for Merchant Marines membership fees (the household depends on him) (Pg 62)
- Seeks adventure in the form of illusion
- Poetry, Movies
- Went to the movies after fighting with Amanda, who represents and reminds him of his responsibilities (Pg 24)
- ILLUSION CANNOT SATISFY HIS URGES FOR FREEDOM
- so went to Merchant Marines, ILLUSION: thinking being physically free would do the trick. (Pg 62)
- REALITY: He cannot escape the reality of abandoning Laura and his guilt towards her.
- Last scene stage directions, did she smile or was it Tom hoping she is okay? (Pg 96)
- He is constantly reminded of her (Pg 97)
- Did he see Laura, or did his guilt drive him to have an imagined memory as a way of seeking forgiveness? (Pg 97)
- Asks Laura to blow out her candles, a sense of completion and letting go (Pg 97)
- SYMBOLIC OF LETTING GO
- of the past
- ALL BECAUSE
- HE CANNOT ESCAPE FROM FAMILIAL TIES
- AMANDA
- Blue Mountain
- "I know what's coming." (Pg 7)
- Amanda constantly reminiscences about Blue Mountain.
- Blue Mountain was her idealised past, where she was sought after and rich.
- Constantly talks about the gentlemen callers that have died and what they have left their widows (Pg 9)
- contrast: While Mr Wingfield did leave the family (abandonment, not death), he did not leave them any wealth
- essentially - I could have chosen someone else, and even if they left (tho, through death), I would still be financially secure
- Constant harping about the gentlemen callers she could have picked - -> regretted her choice of marrying a man who tossed her into poverty and financial struggles
- Amanda's form of escapism.
- She reminisces about the past, to distract herself from her situation
- whilst she does make plans to move on with her life by getting her children to succeed
- She indulges herself by reminiscing of a time where she could choose, and choose right
- which is fantasy.
- Escape from being poor and abandoned
- Seeks security
- PLANNED FOR LAURA TO HEAD TO BUSINESS SCHOOL, but that failed so GENTLEMAN CALLER
- ILLUSION (AMANDA): Laura will be have happiness because all will be well and Jim will marry her as long as I make the right preperations
- IRONY: By perpetuating this misconception, it breaks the illusion (that Laura could be happy)
- Jim's announcement of Betty (Pg 93) was only a result of Amanda pushing Jim and Laura together
- Destruction of illusion
- ILLUSION (AMANDA): as long as Amanda does everything according to plan, life will be good and Laura will be happy
- REALITY: Amanda can't gurantee her daughter's happiness
- Her daughter is ABNORMAL
- LAURA
- Escape from being Abnormal
- ILLUSION: She played with the possibility of being able to lead a normal life with Jim
- She let herself fall in love with Jim, and bought into Amanda's fantasy
- /Laura is abashed beyond speech/ (Pg 87)
- /Laura nods shyly, looking away/ (Pg 87)
- "Somebody - ought to - kiss you, Laura!" (Pg 88)
- and he did
- REALITY: But ultimately, the fantasy of being normal that she has taken to be her illusion couldn't change the reality that Jim was going to marry someone else
- SYMBOL: GLASS MENAGERIE
- represents the fragility of illusions
- once broken, unable to believe in the illusion again, because now you have truth
- ILLUSIONS REQUIRE IGNORANCE OF REALITY
- Glass shatters (Pg 86) to foreshadow how Jim would bring truth to Laura (Pg 89)
- Illusions are shattered by being aware of reality
- She gave the broken unicorn to Jim (Pg 90), giving away the illusion to reality and truth
- crux is still unchanged, and it is this essence that will continue to haunt
- while Tom may try to reconcile his guilt by altering his memories
- The lack of true reconciliation with the players involved doesn't alter the reality that he abandoned his family
- He might try to convince himself that Laura is okay, but in doing so, in the need to convince himself, he is aware that there is a high likelihood that she isn't
- Hence the need for convincing
- Hence, it haunts him, because every time he reassures himself by altering his interpretation of reality, he is reminded OF reality
- Memory play is unrealistic, because memories can be manipulated and altered as a form of escape
- METHODS
- "Being a memory play, it is sentimental, not realistic." (Pg 5)
- Emotions and experience shape memory
- Third paragraph, Pg 3
- "In keeping with the atmosphere of memory, the stage is dim." (Pg xxi)
- Mirrors the hazy effect of memory
- "I give you truth in the pleasant disguise of illusion." (Pg 4)
- TRUTH: His emotions, his guilt
- we understand this from HIS ILLUSION: how he has altered memory, the exaggerations, the treatment of the characters.
- BUT
- RELATIONSHIP OF TOM VS AMANDA
- Their motivations are at a complete opposite
- Security - Amanda (need roots)
- Freedom - Tom (Don't want roots)
- Tom will never be happy serving Amanda's desire for security because it is against his motivations to do so