Apollonian represents the civil, the feminine/Old South/Blanche
Dionysian represents the primal, the masculine/New America/Stanley
Blanche represses the masculine within herself
Because gender non-conformity has ended in tragedy for her in the past (Allan)
Blanche's drinking
Peeks through her repressed masculinity (Dionysus= god of wine)
Stella
Continuously infantilised by her sister and husband
Men returned from war to their wives having greater personal and financial freedom
In the words of Thomas Adler, they were "closer to drudgery than to reap the benefits of the American Dream"
Domestic abuse was normalised at the time
Critics like Helen Deutsch said women were masochists if they faced abuse
Eunice allows the abuse
By "acting as a facsimile to normalise Stanley's abuse" (Susan Koprince) and offering a refuge for a short time but excusing the abuse in the long run
Lenore Walker's model of abuse
Tension building, acute incident, period of loving contrition
Stella is essentially a submissive, self-deprecating wife who tolerates and excuses her husband's behaviour (Susan Koprince)
The men in the play take over Stella's domain (the kitchen) in their poker game
This shows their power in comparison to the hues of Blanche and Stella
Mitch
A boy with an Oedipus complex, wanting to escape his mother yet loyally worshipping her (Sievers)
Mitch fails throughout the poker game to win (at being manly if the cards are a metaphor for masculinity)
Blanche's cultural superiority also emasculates him and he therefore realises she can never replace his mother
The other men do not respect Mitch
Mitch gets Blanche to admit the truth but is unable to rape her, leaving the job to the more manly Stanley (Phillip C Koln)
Feminist critics see the ending of the play as a triumph of the patriarchy
Williams presents the social aberration of sexism
Blanche could be read as a proto-feminist victim
Stanley
The only character who exposes the reality of Belle Reve, showing the pretence of the Old South and its success (off the back of slavery) and how new american immigrants see through this guise
Camp requires the construnction and deconstruction of social hierarchies (Pugh)
Jokes using the N-word demonstrate casual racism and promote the idea that Black people have more primal desires
Negro Woman
Symbolises promiscuity (stereotypically) but also demonstrates the intermixing of races in New Orleans
The jazz in the play is played by "brown fingers" which has an undertone of servitude
Jazz is typically associated with African Americans
Blanche
Her continual use of "Polack" to offend Stanley, and her eugenicist comments about mixing blood show she holds his background against him, especially in her zoomorphic descriptions of him
Marxist critics would see the ending as a triumph of the proletariat, and the mixing of classes (Williams took inspiration from Brecht, a Marxist)
Brecht used methods of theatre to present social aberrations to his audience so that they couldn’t be avoided. Here, Williams presents the social aberration of class.
Rape of the land
Rape of the body ("epic fornications")
Alice Griffiths: '"He insisted that setting, properties, music, sound, and visual effects—all the elements of staging—must combine to reflect and enhance the action, theme, characters, and language."'
Plastic theatre
Expresses emotions or themes through non-verbal elements of the play
Brecht, Chekhov, Hart Crane (quotes in the preface)
Brecht’s Lehrstucke, or morality plays for his communist ideas, seem to be reflected in SND. When Blanche encompasses all of humanity in her expression, Williams evokes Brecht’s works in asking the audience to draw parallels within their own lives.
Plastic theatre elements
Varsouviana Polka to represent Allan
Locomotive to represent masculine power
Williams
Termed himself a symbolist
Bigsby: 'Williams' radicalism is better viewed as a celebration of the outcast'
Williams fits into the genre of Southern Gothic
Because of his kindness and commonality with the outcast
John S Bak: 'Blanche betrays her loyalty to Allan by exposing his homosexuality, just as Stanley does her sexuality'
Lily
Symbolises renewed purity after death, hence why it is used at funerals
Motif of fire
The fireman's ball
The lurid shapes that move like fire before the rape
Blanche screams fire
Symbolises Blanche's destruction through sexual violence
Clurman: 'The play becomes the triumph of Stanley Kowalski with the collusion of the audience, who are no longer on the side of the angels'
“Blanche is the artist in all of us” Harold Clurman
Shep Huntleigh as the embodiment of a perfect man, who is hallucinated by a delusional Blanche.
“Blanche lies as a protection against solitude and desperation” Billington