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A Streetcar Named Desire Rhetorical Analysis

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The tone is the element that brings the entire plot together, driving home the theme of the story by forcing the reader to digest the aspects of the story it amplifies. The voice of the story is overwhelmingly sympathetic in favor of Blanche, causing the audience to have pity on her even in times when they theoretically should not. When Blanche arrives at her sister’s residence, she comes across pretty distraught and nervous, seeming wracked by some horror or another, even saying outright that she couldn’t be alone because she wasn't very well while "her voice drops and her look is frightened” (Williams 17). Right off the bat, the audience is bound to feel sorry for her and even worried for her well-being, a sense of distress and even embarrassment sweeping over the audience just by the state that she entered the stage with and the overwhelming anxiety and pain that seems to swarm …show more content…

With that comes the rise in drug use, both medical and recreational, as people become desperate and will do anything necessary to escape their lives, their reality, the holes they have dug themselves. Blanche DuBois, the main character in A Streetcar Named Desire, is the prime example of this predicament that has existed across generations, resulting to alcohol and the falsifying of her life story in order to escape the real world and instead live in her imagination. She managed to push her mind too far, creating a false persona that began to take over, disfiguring her ability to distinguish what was real and fake, pulling her down into a pit of permanent aberration. The author creatively establishes this theme of madness as a disconnect between reality and fantasy through a use of symbolism, allusion, and a tone that evokes sympathy towards the main character, even in times where the opposite is more

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In Florence Kelley’s heart wrenching call for awareness of child labor she uses quite a few rhetorical devices. An anaphora is the most recognizable as she’s trying to nail in how she would could be helping the children. Pathos is another of her persuasion methods used in her tone. Kelley also uses a fair amount of imagery throughout the passage. First and foremost, Kelley’s use of an anaphora is what really pulls the audience’s attention.

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In day 4 of the reading, Holden takes a cab drive and once again brings up the question of where the ducks go during the winter, symbolizing his childlike curiosity and how he wants to be free from society just like the ducks. Holden brings up the question about the ducks, asking "does somebody come around in a truck or something and take them away?" (Page 82). This shows Holden's childlike curiosity is still prevalent, asking a question that is obviously untrue but an ideal solution to the question. It also symbolizes how he is like a duck, who does not know what he wants to do, whether it is to transition into an adult and fly away, or stay in the lake and freeze in childhood.

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959 Words | 4 Pages

The play A Streetcar Named Desire is one of the most notable plays of the late 1940s to early 1950s and is still prevalent in the theater community today. It originally opened on Broadway in a 1947 at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre, today more commonly known as the Barrymore Theatre, preforming for a little over a thousand patrons. The original Stanley was played by Marlon Brando, who would reprise this role in the movie adaptation. At the Barrymore Theatre, the set was quite complex with a full stairway and banister, a pallor with a 4-chair dinning set and all the dressings of a then modern, but lower-class apartment.

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424 Words | 2 Pages

In Tennesse Williams play “A Streetcar Named Desire” he explores the idea of how an individual’s resilience is shaped by empathy. A person who is able to have empathy benefits from high self-esteem, reduced loneliness, and a strong sense of who they are, and in doing so become more resilient. Empathy assists resilience through developing strong supportive relationships. Williams’ shows the relationship between empathy and resilience through the character Blanche. Blanche struggles to empathize with others thus making her vulnerable and less resilient to change.

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838 Words | 4 Pages

The Limitless Capacity for Growth and Change “‘I wear the chain I forged in life,’ replied the Ghost. ‘I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it’” (A Christmas Carol, Dickens 10). The capacity for human growth and change is beyond limitless; it is an aspect of life that some struggle to achieve, an aspect others struggle to adapt to, and in this ghost’s case, even an aspect of death that continues to imprison him. In A Christmas Carol, a timeless novella demonstrating an opportunity for redemption through change, Charles Dickens employs parallelism, irony, and doppelganger to explore its capacity in contribution to this meaning of the novella as a whole.

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1038 Words | 5 Pages

Tennessee Williams is acclaimed for his ability to create multi faced characters such as Blanche Dubois in the play, A Streetcar Named Desire. She comes to New Orleans after losing everything including her job, money, and her family’s plantation Belle Reve, to live with her sister Stella. During her time there she causes many conflicts with Stella’s husband Stanley and tries to get involved with the people there, all while judging them for their place in society, although she is imperfect too. Through her, Williams has created a complex character. She is lost, confused, conflicted, lashing out in sexual ways, and living in her own fantasies throughout the entirety of the play.

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749 Words | 3 Pages

The Role of Fantasy and Purpose in Individuals “I don’t want realism, I want magic”- Blanche DuBois (Williams 145). In A Streetcar Named Desire, Tennessee Williams presents readers with the acute presence of fantasy in individuals’ lives. Every character fabricates fantasies in his life to gloss over his struggles and forget each other 's flaws. A Streetcar Named Desire evaluates individual’s use of fantasy as a crutch to avoid the hard truths and give purpose to an empty life. Blanche DuBois, the protagonist of the story, uses fantasy to cope with her world crumbling around her.

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Both Blanche's family and Belle Reve represent her dream to indulge in a sophisticated, high class, and luxurious life. When all of Blanche’s family dies and Stella leaves, Blanche loses the first piece of her “beautiful dream.” She no longer has the money to support herself, since her educational career provides insufficient funds. After the tragic loss of her husband, Blanche loses Belle Reve and loses her job, symbolizing that her “beautiful dream” has been fully crushed and the only remnants of her dream are the lies she feeds herself. This fall of social class leads Blanche to carry a tone of classism.

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895 Words | 4 Pages

Blanche flees a failed company and a failed marriage in attempt to find refuge in her sister’s home. Through her whirlwind of emotions, the reader can see Blanche desires youth and beauty above all else, or so the readers think. In reality, she uses darkness to hide the true story of her past. In A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams, Williams uses the motif of light to reveal Blanche’s habit of living in a fantasy world until the light illuminates her reality. Blanche uses darkness to block her past from onlookers as to shape her image.

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The Fight for Dominance In today’s society, gender norms convince men that unless they are able to control women, they are weak. Considered the inferior gender, women must find new ways to prove their own strength, whether it be through manipulation or their sexuality. The battle between the two continues as men strive to remain dominant, often by immoral means, and women attempt to gain the upper hand. In the screenplay, “A Streetcar Named Desire” by Tennessee Williams, the sexual tension and struggle for dominion between Blanche and Stanley is evident, and as the play continues, Blanche's promiscuity and Stanley's predatory nature foreshadow an inevitable confrontation.

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1307 Words | 6 Pages

and she is deeply affected by all the tragedies in her life. She is a tragic character, who is unable to exist in the world which surrounds her so she makes up a better world in her imagination. The world she wishes to live in. People can sympathize with Blanche because of all the tragedy in her life. Susan Henthorne writes in her essay A Streetcar Named Desire, Death and desire bring Blanche to this low point in her life.

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668 Words | 3 Pages

Blanche’s desire for marriage stems from the happiness she felt from her first marriage when she was young. She was completely in love with her husband, and was utterly shocked to find out that he preferred men to the point where she had called him “disgusting”. In the end, he took his own life and Blanche had become widowed. Scarred by the death of her husband, she finds content in the arms of any stranger who admires her façade. Blanche’s dependence on a man is a clear representation of her desperation for a married life.

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959 Words | 4 Pages

A Streetcar named Desire written by American playwright Tennessee Williams is a Marxist play that depicts the socio economic status of the characters and people living during that time. The play was written in 1947, two years after the second world war. The historical time leading up to the Second World War known as the Interwar period from 1918-1939 was an era classified with economical difficulties for a majority of American citizens. After the new economic system based upon capital emerged succeeding the Industrial Revolution, the United States saw a massive prosperity in the early twentieth century only to be demolished by the stock market crash of 1929 also known as Black Tuesday (source). These unsuccessful stock markets were one of the signs that showed that the new system, which depended on an extensive labor force and an open and unregulated market, was not as reliable as previously thought, this period was known as the Depression.

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1547 Words | 7 Pages

Tennessee Williams wrote “A Streetcar Named Desire” (Williams, 1947) It is based in New Orleans a new cosmopolitan city which is poor but has raffish charm. The past is representing old south in America 1900’s and present is representing new America post world war 2 in 1940’s. Past and present are intertwined throughout the play in the characters Stanley, Blanche, Stella and mitch. Gender roles show that males are the dominant and rule the house which Stanley is prime example as he brings home food and we learn of one time when he got cross and he smashed the light bulbs.

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608 Words | 3 Pages

In A Streetcar Named Desire, the author Tennessee Williams exaggerates and dramatizes fantasy’s incapability to overcome reality through an observation of the boundary between Blanches exterior and interior conveying the theme that illusion and fantasy are often better than reality. Blanche, who hides her version of the past, alters her present and her relationship with her suitor Mitch and her sister, Stella. Blanche was surrounded by death in her past, her relatives and husband have passed away, leaving her with no legacy left to continue. The money has exhausted; the values are falling apart and she is alienated and unable to survive in the harsh reality of modern society. Throughout the novel Williams juxtaposed Blanche’s delusions with

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