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A Streetcar Named Desire Tension Essay

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Tension is a powerful literary device that authors use to engage readers and heighten the emotional impact of a story. In Tennesse Williams’s play “A Streetcar Named Desire”, tension is a recurring theme that builds to a critical point, ultimately leading to the downfall of the main characters. Tension is created through the clashing desires and the internal conflicts of the main characters, the setting, and the use of dialogue.

In “A Streetcar Named Desire”, tension is created primarily through the internal conflict between Blanche Dubois and Stanley Kowalski. The tension between them is evident in their actions from the beginning, such as in scene 2 when Blanche is bathing, Stanley interrogates Stella about the loss of “Belle Reve”, the …show more content…

From the moment that Blanche enters the Kowalski’s apartment, it’s clear that she and Stanley have opposing personalities and desires. Blanche, a woman in her thirties who comes from a wealthy family, wants to maintain her illusions of majesty and refinement. On the other hand, Stanley, who represents the working-class, has a more practical and realistic approach to life. He is direct and straightforward in his communication, and he values hard work and physical strength. The tension between the two is heightened by their differing attitudes towards truth. Blanche is a master of illusion and deception, and she is constantly trying to hide her past and present a false image of herself to those around her. Stanley, on the other hand, is brutally honest and direct, and he sees through Blanche's lies and deceptions. “Don’t you think I know that you’re trying to put something over me?” This quote reflects Stanley’s suspicious and increasing awareness of Blanche’s deception and his determination to uncover the truth as he refuses to be taken by her charm and sophisticated manners. On the other hand, Blanche, “I don’t want realism. I want magic!”. This quote represents Balance's desire to escape from reality and to live in a world of her own making. She’s not interested in the harshness of reality, but instead wants to live in a world of “magic” and “fantasy”,

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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 also prefers keeping her past to herself because of all the problems she has had. She prefers for people to not find out what has happened and why she is the way it is. An example is when Blanche panicked because they took off the little paper covering the lamp which made the room dim and got pissed because she did not want to show how she looks. Stanley is shown to be the “manliest man” but he is unstable and irrational when he realizes what he has done when the damage has been done. For example, when Stanley physically abused Stella he realized what he had done when he was brought back to his senses.

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Stella’s sister, Blanche, sees through the illusion and can see how toxic the marriage really is. Stanley and Blanche come from distinctly different backgrounds, Stanley is from the working class while Blanche comes from wealth. Williams uses these two contrasting points of views on marriage, to show the issues of possessiveness, class, and sexism. When it comes to Stanley’s marriage to Stella, one of the most notable characteristics is how possessive Stanley is. An example of this is when Stanley found out that Blanche and therefore Stella, lost their estate.

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1056 Words | 5 Pages

Stella doesn’t stick up for herself and she doesn’t seek to confront her husband’s abusive behavior. As a result, there is tension between Stella and Blanche. Blanche notices her passiveness and sees it as a weakness that is holding Stella back. Stella is very aware of Blanche’s fragility and her past trauma’s but chooses to ignore them to avoid conflict. In the end of the play when Blanche told everybody that Stanley raped her, nobody believed her.

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One major similarity between Blanche and Stanley is that they both like to manipulate or control other people, to make themselves feel better. Even though there are different ways Stanley and Blanche take control of other people they still do it in a familiar matter. For example, Blanche takes power and influence over people by lying to others and herself, to make them believe in something that actually never happened, with fantacy, therefore makes Blanche feel greater, than she actually may be. To go deeper in depth, to prove that Blanche is manipulative she also says. ¨I don 't tell the truth.

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She refused to leave him when Blanche insisted and didn’t believe Blanche when it came to her being raped. Blanche, Stella, and Stanley all have the same want to be desired. The ways they act and treat each other back that up. Blanche feels the need to be desired by everyone around her, Stanley by Stella and others, and Stella by Stanley. Their lives revolve around desire.

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In Blanche and Stanley’s initial interactions, there was an air of sexual tension. This tension dissipates completely as the play progresses, and their relationship turns into a resentful and hateful one. Throughout the play, Stanley has several violent outbursts towards Stella that worry Blanche. This allows Stanley to assert dominance over both women. At the end of the play, Stanley releases his pent up anger and frustration toward Blanche through a sexual attack.

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This aids the lack of empathy that Stanley has towards her. Stanley is always questionable about her situation and does not get “swindled” by her methods of seduction or her lies. This resilience to Blanche allows Stanley to remain the “king around here”. During a majority of the play, Blanche attempts to break Stanley’s resilience to her slutty character by flirting with him. Stanley only once breaks this resilience of her sexual tendencies by raping her.

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Stanley, on the other hand, is aggressive and confrontational, determined to expose Blanche's secrets and bring her down. As the two characters face off against each other, the audience is left wondering who will come out on top. The scene opens with Blanche sitting in the apartment, drinking, and listening to music. Stanley enters the apartment and begins to interrogate her about her past.

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In Scene 10, she deviously claims that she has just received a telegram from the millionaire, Steph Huntleigh, to explain why she is dressed up. At first, Stanley plays along, but once Blanche musters up the audacity to say that Mitch returned to their apartment seeking repentance, Stanley draws the line. He calls her out for her fictitious tales of her past, and states, “We’ve had this date from the start,” just before he maliciously rapes Blanche. Their natures root in primal, animalistic instincts, Stanley like a dirty hog, open and free concerning his sexuality, Blanche like a fox, sly and deceitful. Despite her incessant attempts to destroy her past, Blanche is unable to stop their sexual connection as she has had so many other men.

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One of the first lies that the viewer sees from Blanche where she talks in the present tense is her age, when she talks to men she tells them how she is younger than she actually to gain affection. Another lie she holds is her money that she says she has; acting and wearing clothing that makes her appear as if she holds this large stockpile of money. When in reality, much of her wardrobe consists of items that resemble these lavish items when in fact they aren't worth that much at all. As Stanley begins to catch onto Blanche’ lies he becomes much more confident in who she really is; when she speaks of a new love interest who is “from Dallas where gold sprouts out of the ground” (Williams 124), which is where he knew her persona is built on lies. Lying has always been known to catch up to those who do it.

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Usually when a character is very demanding, the way they act towards others is rude and obnoxious. Blanche and Stanley do clash heads a lot, but they are both antithetical to those close to them. Blanche expects everyone to listen to her and sees herself as the center of attention. She wants everyone and everything to be all about her and the main thing she wants is to be desired. Blanche cannot really have what she wants because she changes her moods on everyone and so it causes people to treat her the opposite from how she wants to be treated.

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698 Words | 3 Pages

As soon as Blanche steps into the Kowalski household and meets Stanley, it is evident that her appearance is a threat to his superiority. Both characters attempt to establish dominance through their control over Stella, a minor character who exists mainly to deepen the contrast between Blanche and Stanley. In scene four, Blanche advises Stella to leave her abusive husband and attempts to influence her by saying “I have a plan for us both, to get us both—out!” (69).

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1413 Words | 6 Pages

Stanley thought money was going to fix the issue. Blanche still continued to get into Stellas head about him but she wasn’t trying to hear it. Blanches independency was what created space between her and Stella because of their opposite views on situations. And due to that fact, Stella saw Blanche as a judgemental

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During this time men brought in the money for the household, while the mother’s would stay at home and watch over the children of the family. With this came a sense of pride and authority for the men. Throughout the film Stanley continually abuses Blanche and even goes to the extreme of raping her. He depicts an animal-like man with no awareness of morals. When he gets angry he has no control of his reactions and results to physical violence.

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