Disclaimer: These notes have been taken from a pack given to the class by our teacher. I believe this pack was made from existing notes possibly found online. I have simply compiled together what I find to be useful.
Blanche explains to Mitch that she lies because she refuses to accept her life, and the hand that fate has dealt her. Lying to herself and to others allows her to make life appear as it should be rather than as it is.Stanley, a practical man firmly grounded in the physical world, disdains Blanche's fabrications and does everything he can to unravel them.Struggle between appearance and reality.Blanche's attempt to remake her own and Stella's existences - to
rejuvenate her life and to save Stella from a life with Stanley end up failing.Reality triumphs over fantasy.Blanche's retreat into her own private fantasies enables her to partially shield herself from reality's harsh blows. Blanche's insanity emerges as she retreats fully into herself, leaving the objective world behind in order to avoid accepting reality.Blanche's final deluded happiness suggests that to some extent, fantasy is a vital force at play in every individual's experience, despite reality's inevitable triumph.
Slide 3
Blanche's Inevitable Timeline
1.) Desire2.) Cemeteries3.) Elysian FieldsThis journey represents the trajectory of Blanche's life.Her fall into madness can be read as the ending brought about by her dual flaws - her inability to act appropriately on her desire and her desperate fear of human mortality.
Slide 4
Dependance On Men
'ASND' presents a sharp critique of the way the institutions and attitudes of postwar America placed restrictions on women's lives.Williams uses Blanche's and Stella's dependance on men to expose and critique the treatment of women during the transition from old to the new South.Blanche and Stella see male companions as their only means to achieve happiness, and they depend on men for their self-image.When Stella chooses to stay with Stanley, she chooses to rely on love, and believe in a man instead of her sister.
Stanley represents a much more secure future than Blanche does.Blanche sees marriage to Mitch as her means of escaping destitution. Men's exploitation of Blanche's sexuality has left her with a poor reputation. Blanche sees marriage as her only possibility for survival.Because Blanche cannot see around her dependence on men, she has no realistic conception of how to rescue herself. She in unable to realise that her dependence on men will lead to her downfall, rather than her salvation.Blanche puts her fate in the hands of other.
