Religion and Morality

• America was founded on Puritan and other Christian principles, which seeped into culture and beliefs, and evolved over time.
• The prejudice against homosexuality and ideas about sexual immorality in the play stem from the Christian principles that America was built on.
• The idea that a “wife must submit to her husband” is a biblical principle as well as something advocated in twentieth-century America, particularly in the Southern states.
• Post-Depression and post-war America desperately tried to revert to “old-fashioned values'’ drawn from Christian principles.
• Williams does not explicitly address religion in the play, but he does address the issue of morality as understood by the American society.
• Blanche is seen struggling with the moral standards that are thrust on her by society.
• Blanche seems to pacify herself even though she is aware of her deceit, convincing herself that she never “lied in [her] heart” (Scene Nine) and was never “deliberate[ly] cruel” (Scene 10).
• The play can be understood as a critique of conventional notions of morality as sexual standards are double standards - they fall more heavily on women.
• Multiple lovers leave Blanche labelled and ostracised and feeling defiled, while Stanley gets away with domestic abuse and rape.
• Bert Cardullo sees Streetcar, then, as a christian tradegdy, the impetus of Blanche's destruction coming not from stanley nor from the denial of her husband's homosexuality, but from his suicide, which she feels was the result from her denial. - Jac Tharpe, Tennessee Williams: A Tribute