Colours seem to reflect their different notions: Blanche often wears white – stressing her belief in etiquette and purity which is further emphasised by her name, Blanche Dubois, meaning “White Woods” in French. Williams therefore emphasises her gentility and refinement and shows her expectation that men will be chivalrous – “Please don’t get up” she says to the men at the Poker Game, assuming they will.
Stanley is presented very differently: Williams only gives a little physical description of him: “of medium height…strongly, compactly built”. This stresses and shows his ability to clearly be prepared for the practical nature of New Orleans. He is often dressed in brightly coloured shirts, creating a visual impact for the audience, similar to the impact Stanley has on those around him. Stanley’s bright colours represent his dominance and masculinity, stressing his belief that men are to be dominant. Whilst he does not claim this, his behaviour indicates so. When he throws the meat in Scene 1, Stella is quick to catch it: “He heaves the package at her. She cries out in protest but manages to catch it: then she laughs breathlessly.” Not only does this demonstrate Stanley’s primitive nature but symbolically it may suggest Stanley’s ability to satisfy women, representing his intimate relationship with Stella. Stella is willing to uphold Stanley’s role as ‘hunter-gatherer’ and support her husband, showing a shift from Dubois to Kowalski.
Meanwhile, unlike Stella, Blanche wants to be the woman in charge. Stella is able to adapt to Stanley’s world, by accepting his dominance. We not only get the sense that Blanche will be unable to accept Stanley’s world, but that both of their needs for dominance could cause conflict.
Both individuals represent a world that the other cannot really access, although there is the hope for acceptance of one another’s beliefs early on in the play.
Stanley’s need to dominate and his belief that Blanche and her notions are imposing upon this leads to conflict in Scene Three, The Poker Night. The opening scene of the Poker night immediately captures our attention with significant visual elements such as light and bold primary colours showing the harsh masculinity of the men and how ‘they are at the peak of their manhood’. His dominating colours are contrasted with Blanche’s whites and pastels that create her ‘delicate beauty’. Stanley certainly associates her with the feminine world that is less powerful: “You could not. Why don’t you women go up and sit with Eunice” and ultimately snubs Blanche when she shows an eagerness to become part of the manly scene: “Could I kibitz”.
Stanley’s response leads Blanche to be more defiant. Blanche then moves into the bedroom with Stella, where she creates her “world” represented by her “pink silk brassiere”, stressing her world of gentility and contrasts with the bold, primary colours in the kitchen. Furthermore “STELLA has removed her dress and put on a light blue satin kimono”, this shows Stella’s shift to pastel colours and therefore representing her as part of Blanches world. This develops into a battle over space and Williams uses the stage directions to communicate this division. This creates conflict because Stanley is unable to accept Blanches’ beliefs, but it is also threatening to his relationship with Stella because he is unable to be part of Blanches’ world. Therefore, when “Rhumba Music comes over the radio” in the bedroom, which portrays Blanches refinement and gentility, he “jumps up and, crossing to the radio, turns it off.”; this shows a rise in conflict between their different notions.
This use of visual and sounds effects, like the use of Rhumba music in this scene are in line with New Plastic Theatre – Williams’s intention to bring us ‘close’ to the truth by using symbols and creating an atmosphere that would increase the impact of action. These techniques remind us of the Cinema art form, Williams was clearly influenced by Cinema, as he did grow up in the 20’s and 30’s – the golden age of Hollywood cinema, also previously being a film critic for his High School magazine. Therefore Williams has used these techniques and used them to stress the contrasts in notions, such as the contrast in visual coloured costumes and sound effects such as music.
As the scene progresses Blanche continues to show her literary knowledge when she says “Why, that’s my favourite sonnet by Mrs Browning!” to impress Mitch, showing her intellectual superiority, something which Stanley lacks. This contrasts with the colloquial language used in Stanley’s world in the kitchen, for example: “This game is Spit in the Ocean”. Therefore Stanley could feel insecure because her notions undermine his. Meanwhile Blanches’ insecurity is because her notions cannot exist any longer.
However, Stanley will win because of the practical nature of the world and the “survival of the fittest”. Stanley’s practicality is shown throughout the play, through his dominance and his knowledge on the “Napoleonic Code according to which what belongs to the wife belongs to the husband”. This shows Stanley’s need for factual evidence and honesty, which portrays his ability to survive.
Blanche at times recognises that her world of gentility cannot exist which is represented through the end of the Beautiful Dream. We see how despite her opposing beliefs of gentility, it is her loneliness and desperation which leads her to wanting to mix with the Kowalski’s – however Stanley cannot accept Blanche and her notions because her reality is she is not capable of being honest and prefers to live in a delusional world. In Scene 10, she again refuses to be honest and tells Stanley about her man “from Dallas”, showing her incapability of being honest and wish to live in her fantasy world, which Stanley destroys. It is when Stanley’s world is insulted and threatened by Blanche which leads to even Stella calling him “Drunk – drunk – animal thing, you!” after the division in Scene Three that Stanley is unable to live alongside Blanches ‘world’ without feeling threatened and insulted. However, Blanches is world is non-existent and the Dubois therefore represents the decadence of beauty, shown through Blanche; this is shown through her self obsession and negative focus on her appearance: “don’t look at me Stella…till I’ve bathed and rested.” Her passion for taking long hot baths can be taken as a symbol of her yearning to wash away her guilt and be purified. We are furthermore given this impression when she asks whether the grapes are clean – the white and wanting to be cleansed shows her diminishing purity. After the rape, Blanche can perhaps no longer be pure and so her downfall is realised; due to the action of Stanley, feeling threatened by her as she was a reminder to him of what he could not be and what Stella used to be.
Symbolism throughout the play suggests that once Stanley and Blanche realise their opposing positions, Stanley will always overcome Blanche: Stanley’s primitiveness and brutish nature associate him with an animal, whereas Williams describes Blanche as a “moth”. A moth is associated with delicacy and is vulnerable, but also represents her dislike of being seen in light, like that of a moth, the light represents truth and therefore her inability to say the truth. Stanley is powerful and represents a new heterogeneous America, a social leveller, unlike aristocratic upper class Dubois who show decline and are associated with the Old South. Unlike Stanley, Blanche has none of the practical skill to survive. For example in Scene Four she is unable to use a phone and instead of trying, she hides from reality asserting: ‘I don’t want realism’, instead she wants her fantasy world and this leads to her delusion; she believes the lies that she tells to Stanley, which makes Stanley despise her as much as he does. It is this too, which makes her use sexuality to survive, which she explains in Scene Five:
“Have to be seductive – put on soft colours, the colours of butterfly wings, and glow – make a little - temporary magic just in order to pay for - one night’s shelter”
Here, Stanley objects to this and he uses this to bring Blanche to her tragic end in the rape scene. Williams therefore shows how Blanche’s notions are non-existent and can therefore no longer survive compared to Stanley’s notions in evidence and truth, which enable him to survive in society without the gentility and refinement which Blanche presented, Williams therefore shows how the decadence of these notions must end tragically because Blanche has to accept the end to her notions and also be able to survive in a straight-forward, practical society.
