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Masculinity In A Streetcar Named Desires By Tennessee Williams

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Throughout the play as a whole Tennessee Williams creates conflict between the two genders. Particularly in Stanley, the concept of masculinity is associated with a brutish, aggressive, primal force as well as sexual sensuality. Throughout the play, his raw power is regularly highlighted, and he fiercely displays his supremacy by loud actions and violence. Even his wardrobe exudes power. The "sub-human" has a strong connection to Stanley's masculinity. Williams calls him a "gaudy seed-bearer" and a "richly feathered bird among hens." However, Tennessee Williams describes stella as tolerant on Stanley's behaviour and is like to be “waited on". Stella is also raised as aristocrat in the old south, so she is well educated and has manners.

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Stella is trying to manifest superiority over Stanley while agreeing with her sister. She then says, “your face and finger are disgustingly greasy.” This insults and rejects Stanley status and belief as a dominant figure creating huge tension between the two genders. However, Stanley uses zoomorphism to get his dominance back as he says “every man is king” suggesting that everything he says should be listened to. Whist telling Stella not call him a “pig- Polack- disgusting – vulgar – greasy". This is ironic as he doesn’t want to be called 'disgusting’ or ‘vulgar’ even though his actions reflect that. It's not appropriate to treat his pregnant wife with such abuse and aggression, his carelessness is further continued by his lack of shame and empathy for when stella starts to cry and this just shows how cruel men were as they supported the patriarchy. Further on we can see that Stanley and stella relationship is built on sex “Them nights we had together.” Stanley does this to manipulates Stella by threatening to take this away from her. However, this completely different with blanche who is insecure and need to be …show more content…

This is shown through the rape scene when Stanley says top Blanche “we’ve had this date with each other from the beginning!” This ironic as both Blanche and Stanley have flirted with each other earlier in the play. Also, previously in scene four blanche said to stella “the only way to live with such a man is go to bed with him". In scene eleven stella admits to Eunice that “I couldn’t believe her story and go on living with Stanley". This implies that Blanche has told her about the rape. However, stella can't bring herself to accept the facts as it will ruin the relationship, she has with Stanley and she's about to have a baby which she can't afford to raise on her’ own. This shows how toxic masculinity were as William presents them as been created, perpetuated and reinforced by the patriarchal system under which the characters and indeed the people of the world lived in America in the late 1940s. Domestic abuse was not taken seriously by the authorities, spousal rape wasn’t illegal and men had no outlet for their emotions in the way that women had such as being able to cry without ridicule or being able to

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At the time, society’s norms led Stanley to believe that ‘“Every Man is a King!”’ and that he was the king over his own household (Williams, Scene 8 page 131). This ideal influenced Stanley to be power hungry and abusive, which negatively affected his relationship with his wife Stella. However, Stanley never gave up on Stella when she ran away because he was determined to be a good husband (Williams, Scene 3 page 65).

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That is why he hates Blanche because she is not the same as the girls he has seen. He sees her as a threat in the sense that she will ruin the marriage between Stella and Stanley. However, he has feelings of self conscious and feels threatened because he feels like she can ruin him. He hates that Stella and Blanche were always wealthy and he feels as if they look down on him for being poor. He does not feeling submissive which is why he reacts harshly most of the time.

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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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He desires a normal life with Stella, without Blanche in the picture. As told in A Streetcar Named Desire--Psychoanalytic Perspectives, “After exposing all of Blanches shameful secrets and destroying her plans to marry Mitch, Stanley completes her violation and subjugation by raping her, which drives her to insanity” (A Streetcar Named Desire--Psychoanalytic Perspectives, Silvio). Stanley desires a normal life without Blanche so bad, that he completely broke her to get it. Stanley also wants to be desired.

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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 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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She constantly refers to Stanley as a Polack, and reprimands Stella because she chooses to “hang back with the brutes,” when she, in reality, has a lower economic status than either of them. Blanche’s classist comments and lies display her insecurity in losing her place in the hierarchy of classism. Angering Stanely by her racist and classist claims, Blanche begins to boil the rage that leads to her vicious

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In other words, Stella is very aware that her sexual relationship with Stanley can help her sort out any problems between them. Also, shortly before Stanley rapes Blanche, Williams says in the stage directions that there were “inhuman voices like cries in the jungle” (399; sc. 10). Blanche, which means white wood, is out of her element in this jungle of Stanley’s and it is she, who once called Stanley “bestial” (322; sc. 4) and “sub-human” (323; sc. 4), who has now found herself being stalked and charged like prey being hunted by an animal. With his sister-in-law present, Stanley has been unable to fulfill his sexual desires and so he releases them out on Blanche.

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Quote and Explain, In contrast, Stella has both a husband and a child, she has something to work for, leading her to be accepted into society. Although Stella exemplifies these common traits, she falls under the same category as her sister, Blanche. While being depicted as less in comparison to the opposite sex. The intense description of the stage directions in scene three, depicts Stella as the prey and Stanley as the predator as he vigorously abused

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It also highlights Stella’s submissive nature, and how she conforms to the sexist societal expectations of a helpless and fragile woman. Although the surrounding male characters disregard Stanley’s abuse, the audience is repulsed by it and identifies it as morally wrong. This shows how Williams is criticising the acceptance of this abusive behaviour in society, using Stella’s dilemma as a victim to plea for a change. Stanley is even abusive when displaying his

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This is made clear through Stanley’s insecurities about inferiority to women and his prolonged struggle to defeat Blanche. Again, this is evident with Blanche and even Stella. Stella is perceived as a static character with no real individuality, and Blanche, who is seemingly more independent, is characterized mostly by her sexuality. Tennessee Williams demonstrates society’s need for the superiority of men to women through the interactions of Stanley and Blanche in the play, their struggles, and their ultimate

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He had slaps her in her face, when Stanley is in front of his friends he get out of hand. He asks different in front of his wife Stella. In the real world, when men hang out with their friends, they feel like they are the boss, so they start to show out to proof that they are man enough to put women in there place. Knowing that when they are around their wife’s they act so different because if their friends see how men act, they would think that he is a coward. When Stanley is with Stella, he is sober and he is sweet and caring to her.

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Stella lived her life depending on him whereas Blanche was currently on her own after her marriage and had no one to depend on but herself. Unfortunately there was a commotion that occured in scene 4 between Stanley and Stella. Blanche went to check up on Stella and was brutally convincing her to leave Stanley. The way that Stella responded to her made her look naive over the fact that Stanley was the issue. When Blanche and Stella were talking, Stella goes, “Stanley doesn’t give me a regular allowance, he likes to pay bills himself but this morning he gave me ten dollars to smooth things over (Williams, 78).

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To Blanche, Stanley originally comes off as appealing however once he rapes her, he becomes monstrous in her eyes. On the contrary, Blanche is not exactly humane as well. Blanche is the extreme version of how a female was represented in the mid-1900s, but takes crazy too far. As opposed to helping Blanche deal with the world, her fantasizing is more destructive then helpful. Stanley’s violent rape of Blanche is a wake up call from her fantasy life, the final straw in her mental decline, leading to her

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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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