In the following text, I would like to discuss the presentation of the character Blanche DuBois, in act one by Tennessee Williams.
In the following text, I would like to discuss the presentation of the character Blanche DuBois, in act one by Tennessee Williams. At first I want to say something about her name. It is of French origin as it means "White from the woods" when it is translated. On the one hand, white stands for virginity, youth, freshness, clearness, but on the other hand also for innocence. It is also contrasting with "from the woods" as I associate woods with a dark colour. It could be that she has a good and a bad side or that she seems to be free of problems, but has loads of them. These are the first thoughts a reader of "Streetcar named desire" might have, when he reads this name.
The setting of this play is in New Orleans, in a poor quarter where many different nationalities are mixed up.
The first description we are given of Blanche DuBois is in scene one in the stage directions. These are very important as they give us a first impression of Blanche:
[Blanche comes around a corner, carrying a valise. She looks at a slip of paper, then at the building, then again at the slip and again at the building. Her expression is one of shocked disbelief. Her appearance is incongruous to this setting. She is daintily dressed in a white suit with a fluffy bodice, necklace and ear-rings of pearl, white gloves and hat, looking as she were arriving at a summer tea or cocktail party in the garden district. She is about five years older than Stella. Her delicate beauty must avoid a strong light. There is something about her uncertain manner, as well as her white clothes, that suggests a moth.]
At first, she seems to be just a high-strung, but refined, woman who has come to New Orleans to pay her sister Stella a visit, but then you notice that Blanche is not sure where she lives. I think Blanche DuBois has never visited her sister before. From her gestures and her clothing you can tell instantly that she is a stranger. Tennessee Williams describes her clothes as very elegant, expensive and posh. She is obviously out of place. He gives us the impression that she has secrets aswell as he writes "Her delicate beauty must avoid a strong light." I link light with secrets that shall be dazzled by it. He compares her with a moth that is attracted to light. If it gets too close it will be burned by it. That is a symbol for Blanche DuBois and her fragility.
As soon as she speaks, to ask directions from Eunice Hubbell, her sister's upstairs neighbour, you can be sure that Blanche is used to more refined surroundings. Despite Blanche's doubts that Stella really lives in such a place, Eunice assures her that she has found the right address. She is shocked of where her sister lives and cannot believe it. When Blanche discloses she is Stella's sister, Eunice escorts Blanche into the apartment. Eunice wants to chat, but Blanche asks her to be alone, claiming to be tired from her trip. She wanted to talk with her about ...
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As soon as she speaks, to ask directions from Eunice Hubbell, her sister's upstairs neighbour, you can be sure that Blanche is used to more refined surroundings. Despite Blanche's doubts that Stella really lives in such a place, Eunice assures her that she has found the right address. She is shocked of where her sister lives and cannot believe it. When Blanche discloses she is Stella's sister, Eunice escorts Blanche into the apartment. Eunice wants to chat, but Blanche asks her to be alone, claiming to be tired from her trip. She wanted to talk with her about her home-place, the plantation "Belle Reve", but Blanche does not want to talk about that. To me it seems aswell that she refuses it to talk with Eunice, because she is not posh and uneducated. Blanche clings to the manners and speech of Southern gentility. Pretending it is important to her. It makes her feel special and better than others. When Eunice offers to let her in until Stella is at home, she asks: "How could I do that?" This question shows the posh and genteel Southern way of life, Blanche is convinced of.
In the following stage direction Tennessee Williams reveals an immense amount of Blanche's body language, gestures and behaviour:
[Blanche sits in a chair very stiffly with her shoulders slightly hunched and her legs pressed close together and her hands tightly clutching her purse as if she were quiet cold. After a while the blind look goes out of her eyes and she begins to look slowly around. A cat screeches. She catches her breath with a startled gesture. Suddenly she notices something in a half-open closet. She springs up and crosses to it, and removes a whiskey bottle. She pours a half tumbler of whiskey and tosses it down. She carefully replaces the bottle and washes out the tumbler at the sink. Then she resumes her seat in front of the table.]
The way she sits, her behaviour when the cat screeches and the sudden impulse of alcohol to calm her nerves down, show that she is very insecure, nervous and not confident. She has problems and thinks that her sister's home is a horrible place to live. Spying a bottle of whiskey in the closet, she suddenly breaks out of her dejected stupor. She pours a healthy shot, downs it immediately, replaces the bottle, cleans her tumbler, and returns to her original pose. The fact that she tries to keep it a secret that she has drunk whiskey is an evidence for her insecurity aswell. She drinks on the sly in order to withdraw from the harsh reality. Her nervousness is shown in the sentence "I've got to keep hold myself!" that she says. Whatever has caused Blanche's agitation begins to unfold soon after Stella returns. They embrace and Blanche talks feverishly and seems nearly hysterical. She tells Stella to turn off the over-light, because she does not want to be seen the way she looks like at the moment. I think she does not want the light on her because it is exposing the truth. In the following stage direction when she wants to have another tumbler of whiskey, you can see that she is very nervous, hysterical - mentally unstable: [She rushes to the closet and removes the bottle; she is shaking all over and panting for breath as she tries to laugh. The bottle nearly slips from her grasp.] She lies to her sister when she seeks the bottle of whiskey, because she knows where it is. As Blanche speaks, she reveals her unsettled emotional state. In just a brief dialogue with her sister, Blanche expresses affection, shock, modesty, concern for Stella, vanity, resentment and uncertainty about herself. While almost every sentence reveals another dimension of Blanche's inner turbulence, the dialogue also illustrates the relationship between the sisters. She treats Stella in a patronising way and is domineering.
Stella says in the text to Blanche: "You never did give me a chance to say much, Blanche. So I just got in the habit of being quiet around you."
In the first scene, we get to know that Blanche works as a teacher. She explains that she has suffered a nervous breakdown and has therefore taken a leave from her teaching job in the middle of the term. Here she presented as the burnt out teacher, but you can notice that she is lying when she says that to her sister, because of her strange behaviour: [Nervously tamping cigarette], [She drinks quickly.] These actions are meant to cover up this lie. She is dishonest. The truth is that she had sex with a 17-year-old boy of her class, but that is not revealed in this scene.
Blanche then disparages Stella's messy apartment. She cannot believe that she has only two rooms. Blanche wants to maintain her Southern way of life and behaves like this. Also she reproaches Stella for gaining so much weight. Blanche does not know that she is pregnant. Blanche comes across as a frivolous, hysterical, insensitive, and self-obsessed individual as she derides her sister's lesser social status.
In the following quotation you can see again that Blanche is very bossy and plays the big, domineering sister: "You hear me? I said stand up! You messy child, you, you've spilt something on that pretty white lace collar! About your hair- you ought to have it cut in a feather bob with your dainty features..."
On the other hand Blanche wants to be ensured that she is looking very well. She is fishing for compliments: "I want you to look at my figure! [She turns around.] You know I haven't put on one ounce in ten years, Stella? ..."
You can see that Blanche has lots of thoughts about the way she looks like. She recognizes that she is getting older. "You see I still have that awful vanity about my looks even now that my looks are slipping!" In my opinion, that is also a reason, why she does not want to be seen in the light.
Now there is a point in scene one where you are informed about Blanche's loneliness. She tells Stella the following: "I want to be near by you, got to be with somebody, I can't be alone! Because - as you must have noticed - I'm not very well. ..." This quotation shows aswell that she is aware of her mental state. Stella notices that she is nervous and overwrought. Blanche worries about whether Stanley will like her but also she does not speak well about him. He is not the type of man she is accustomed to. I think Stella already knows that Stanley and Blanche are not going to get along. They come from two different worlds. Blanche is posh and a descendant of a rich, aristocratic family. He is not the type of man they went out with at home, because of "his civilian background".
Blanche now turns the conversation to news of their home. She tries to tell Stella that Belle Reve is lost. Therefore she uses a very dramatic and emotional language. She has frightened of Stella as she could be reproaching her for this. The entire burden descended on Blanche's shoulders, because Stella left Belle Reve after the death of their father.
Blanche has suffered trough the deaths of all her relatives, save Stella, and the loss of her home and old way of life. "I, I, I took the blows in my face and my body! All of those deaths! The long parade to the graveyard! Father, mother! Margaret, that dreadful way!"
Every death had to be paid for with a little piece of Belle Reve, and gradually the place just slipped away through Blanche's fingers. More shocked than angry, Stella says nothing. Blanche thinks that Stella doubts the story and cruelly lashes out at her sister: "Yes, accuse me! Sit there and stare at me, thinking I let the place go! I let the place go? Where were you. In bed with your - Polack!"
Blanche's attack on Stella suggests the intensity of her feelings about the loss. On the other hand, she could be covering up the facts, possibly to protect herself, possibly because she can't face the truth. Unable to accept responsibility, she may be casting blame on the dead people in her family and ultimately on her little sister, all characters, take note, without the capacity to defend themselves. Blanch has suffered terribly. Loneliness and desire are integral to her being. She chose the harsh road of staying at Belle Reve to care for the dying, and she has suffered because of it. For many years, she was a delicate young woman who lived alone in house full of the terminally ill.
When Stella runs to the bathroom in tears, Stanley returns from bowling. This is the first encounter between him and Blanche. He asks her a lot of questions. Finally, when Stanley asks her about her marriage, Blanche cannot talk about it with him. The only thing she said: "The boy - the boy died. [She sinks back down.] I'm afraid I'm - going to be sick! [Her head falls on her arms.]" It seems that the subject is too painful for her or that she has something to hide. But at this point we know that she was married. She must have been very young, because she is talking of a boy. It is a very dramatic ending.
Anne Kolouschek
2 MA
