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A Streetcar Named Desire Responsibilities Essay

734 Words3 Pages

As individuals mature and grow older, the responsibilities they face develops alongside them. Around 1940, postwar society created a system where different individual served a key role in their society and had varying responsibilities they had to face. Responsibility plaining means to “do the right thing” and to live a life where each reaction is as a result of one’s own action that is intended not to harm others. Many seek responsibilities as a duty that they must abide by while others may seek an escape from it as if to abstain their duties thus not having to suffer doing something that they don’t enjoy. In A Streetcar Named Desire, Tennessee Williams uses different individuals to showcase their responsibilities and how their actions result …show more content…

Stanley is a character who take certain responsibilities that eventually positions him as a dominant figure within his household. He provides for his family by working at a factory, and, when he “brings home the meat” at the beginning of the play Tennessee Williams references an animalistic approach similar to that of the cavemen who has the responsibility for hunting food to provide for his family. In various occasions throughout the play, he is seen to take a stand against any request that is unwillingly given to him, specially during times when he is upset such as arguing with Blanche when Stella requests him to come to the porch or during one of the poker games in which he seemed to be losing and blames the ladies for their loud conversation. Immediately afterwards the ladies start to play music which aggravates him even more and leads to Stanley throwing the radio out through the window thus breaking it. Stanley serves to play a dominant role within his family but his nature and attitude is far from being developed. While Stanley posses the ability to assert dominance over others, which builds a leadership role within his character, others such as Blanche, see him as a working-class “Polack” referring to his “Polish” background and thus implying that he is an immigrant. She also notices his violent “ape” like behaviour to make remark of his animalistic nature. During

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Stanley is a blunt, practical, and animalistic man who has no patience for subtleties and refinement. His animalistic character shows the moment he meets Blanche, when he, moving with “animalistic joy” (24), “sizes” Blanche up with “sexual classifications” and “crude image” in his mind (25). Under his stare, Blanche draws “involuntarily back” (25), a movement that foreshadows their later conflict and her subsequent demise. His practical and straightforward side shows when he interrogates Blanche about the sale of Belle Reve to make sure that his wife is not swindled. His straightforward, practical nature makes him “boom” out of impatience (46) and demands Blanche to cut straight to the point when she tries to talk in an indirect, subtle manner as befit a Southern gentlewoman.

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She brings this sense of superiority to Stella who unintentionally tries to distinguish her background from Stanley as well. Stanley recognizes the fact that Blanche looks down on him forcing him to assert his masculinity over her. Stanley’s dominance over the household and Stella is being questioned upon Blanche’s

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In A Streetcar Named Desire, there is an ongoing power struggle between Stanley and Blanche, which propels the narrative. Stanley has the power of masculine physicality and mentality whereas Blanche only has the power of her background, of which she feigns to be her class. As the battle between the two is predominantly over Stella, we begin to witness in scene 2, where Stanley openly accuses Blanche of hiding “legal papers connected with the plantation”. His aggressive nature, towards her, motivates the idea of his resentment towards her, as

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He demands respects and is sure of it that he will get his way. In some situations, Blanche is there to stop him from getting what he wants. The way Stanley treats those around him is ugly and mean and the more he does that they can finally realize that they are not his puppets. This is all evident through "She's not stayin' here after Tuesday. You know that, don't you?

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