Literary Context Response of Tennessee Williams

Thomas Lanier Williams

          Although Tennessee Williams wrote fiction he drew heavily from his own life for inspiration, making his works nearly autobiographical, and while reading his play, "A Streetcar Named Desire" an understanding of his family and upbringing adds a great deal of depth to its characters Blanche, Stella, and Stanley.  According to the Gale Literary Database entry on Williams, "he spent his first seven years with his mother, his sister, Rose, and his maternal grandmother and grandfather, and Episcopal rector.  A sickly child, Tom was pampered by doting elders.  In 1918, his father, a traveling salesman who had often been absent, [...] moved the family to St. Louis.  [...]  The contrast between leisurely small-town past and northern big-city present, between protective grandparents and the hard-drinking, gambling father with little patience for the sensitive son he saw as a "sissy," seriously affected both children.  While Rose retreated into her own mind until finally beyond the reach even of her loving brother, Tom made use of the adversity."  (Gale 9)  The Norton Anthology expands on Williams and his family, "His Mother, "Miss Edwina," the daughter of an Episcopalian minister, was repressed and genteel, very much the southern belle in her youth.  His father Cornelius, was a traveling salesman, often away from his family and often violent and drunk when at home.  As a child Williams was sickly and overly protected by his mother; he was closely attached to his sister, Rose, repelled by the roughhouse world of boys, and alienated from his father."  (Baym 1113)  With this background information at hand I can clearly see where Blanche and Stanley come from.  Stanley is the embodiment of Williams' father, an absent, gambling, drinking, violent man.  Blanche on the other hand, I believe is a combination of Williams mother and sister; she is the classy, proper, refined southern belle, but also has psychological problems.  While I'm sure there are other people and experiences that factor into his characters, I can definitely see his sister and parents portrayed in Streetcar.

          I also found that the conflicts within Streetcar are incarnations of Williams own struggles with identity and his perceived place in society.  The Gale database states, "Williams family problems, his alienation from the social norm resulting from his homosexuality, his sense of being a romantic in an unromantic, postwar world, and his sensitive reaction when a production proved less than successful all contributed significantly to his work."  (Gale 11)  I think this statement sheds some light onto Stella's unhealthy relationship with Stanley, and her desire to stay in it even though he is blatantly abusive in front of family and friends.  I believe their relationship is representing the social norm as Williams sees it, and Blanche, the single and promiscuous old maid, is just outside of that norm, and from the poker night on is slowly pushed farther and farther away until finally being sent away.  In his article, "Tennessee One-Step, author Terry Teachout notes, "The particular "family madness" that became Williams's main subject was sexual inhibition.  Like so many gay playwrights of his generation, Williams found it difficult to come to terms with the furtive urges that his mother (as portrayed in The Glass Menagerie) regarded with a mixture of contempt and fear: 'Don't quote instinct to me!  Instinct is something that people have got away from!  It belongs to animals!  Christian adults don't want it!'"  (Teachout 75)  This struggle with sexuality is uncannily depicted in opposing ways by Blanche and Stanley.  Stanley is very open about his sexuality, in fact he does and takes what he wants, and in the end has the happier ending staying at home with his wife and child.  While Blanche struggles with her sexuality and tries to suppress her desires, and in the end she loses everything; her home, family, sanity, and loses whatever sexual power she may have had after being raped by Stanley.  I can see Williams's dilemma, should he try and fit into the social norm and be accepted or do what is right for him and be ostracized from society?

          Throughout my research, the thing that really caught my eye was the fact that Williams is considered to be one of the three best playwrights of the 20th century, even though he had relatively few successful plays in comparison to his many flops.  According to the Gale Database, The Glass Menagerie and A Streetcar Named Desire alone won 2 New York Drama Critics Circle Awards, 2 Donaldson Awards, a Pulitzer Prize, and he continued to win awards and prizes for many other plays as well.  (Gale 1)  I think this is pretty amazing considering Williams was a gay man writing in the 40's and 50's when homosexuality was not accepted.  Williams turning point happened in the 1960's in Teachout's opinion when, "The sexual permission that Williams helped create sort of robbed him of a platform.  He found himself a revolutionary in a post-revolutionary era.  By the time the 60's rolled around, the things Williams had liberated were everywhere irrelevant."  (Teachout 76)  I believe that while Williams helped create a sexual openness that was crucial to the social movements of the 60's, he had the misfortune of being born or starting his career about a decade too late.  A little earlier and he may have enjoyed a longer run of success, but because of the social movements and sexual revolution of the 60's, Tennessee Williams's works became commonplace instead of titillating. 

Works Cited:

Teachout, Terry. "Tennessee One-Step." Commentary (2014): 75-77. Literary Reference Center. Web. 20 Mar. 2015.

Tennessee Williams. N.p.: n.p., 2008. Contemporary Authors. Web. 1 Mar. 2015. 
     <http://galenet.galegroup.com>. 

Williams, Tennessee. "A Streetcar Named Desire." 1947. 1865-Present. Ed. Nina 
     Baym. 8th ed. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2013. 1113-77. Print. 
     Vol. 2 of The Norton Anthology of American Literature. 2 vols.