A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams (AQA A-Level English Literature A): Revision Notes
Context
Understanding context for your exam
Context is a crucial element of your A-Level English Literature studies, forming one of the five Assessment Objectives (AO3). Understanding and discussing context accounts for roughly 24% of your total marks across both examination papers, making it essential to your success. When examiners assess your work, they are looking for evidence that you grasp the importance and impact of the circumstances surrounding the text's creation and reception. In other words, you need to demonstrate how the ideas within the play connect to the broader world in which Tennessee Williams was writing.
Context encompasses various elements that shaped the creation and reception of a literary work. For A Streetcar Named Desire, relevant contextual factors include:
- Williams' personal background and experiences
- The historical period in which he lived and wrote
- How audiences initially responded to the play
- The literary traditions and genres Williams drew upon
- The play's performance history across different productions
If you were considering Williams' depiction of gender dynamics in the 1940s, for instance, you might examine how societal expectations of that era influenced his characterisation.
Context is evaluated consistently throughout your examination responses. It is vital that you develop comprehensive knowledge of the play's contextual background to fully appreciate its meanings and implications. Consider what Williams' original audiences would have understood or been thinking about as they watched the performance. These contemporary viewers were the intended recipients of Williams' message, and understanding their perspective will deepen your interpretation of the text and help you make sense of references within it.
Exam tip
The key to successfully incorporating context in your examination responses is relevance and integration. Rather than adding contextual information as an afterthought at the end of paragraphs or essays, weave relevant context throughout your answer to develop and illustrate your arguments.
Examiners want to see how contextual understanding enhances your interpretation of specific moments in the play. For example, instead of writing everything you know about Williams' father, focus on how his alcoholic father's influence can be seen in Stanley's characterisation and behaviour.
Authorial context: Tennessee Williams' life
Williams' personal experiences profoundly influenced his dramatic works, with many characters drawing directly from relationships and events in his own life. Born Thomas Lanier Williams III in Mississippi in 1919, he acquired the nickname Tennessee during his university years, a reference to his home state. His childhood was marked by significant difficulties and family dysfunction.
His parents' marriage was deeply unhappy, characterised by conflict and resentment. His father, Cornelius Coffin Williams, worked as a salesman and came from a working-class background. He was frequently absent from family life, showing little interest in his parental responsibilities, and struggled with alcoholism. Meanwhile, his mother, Edwina Williams, came from a very different world. She was a Southern Belle, the daughter of an Episcopal minister and an educated music teacher from a higher social class. Edwina strongly disapproved of her husband's drinking, affairs, and general lifestyle, feeling that his behaviour compromised her social standing and respectability.
During his childhood, Williams experienced considerable trauma and isolation. He spent two years confined to bed due to illness, which left him feeling reserved and emotionally fragile. Additionally, he faced ostracism and bullying from his peers at school. However, he maintained a close relationship with his sister Rose, who later developed mental illness and was institutionalised.
Williams himself was homosexual, living during an era when homosexuality was widely regarded as a mental disorder rather than a natural aspect of human identity. This societal prejudice is reflected throughout his dramatic work.
These difficult early experiences and relationships clearly shaped Williams' creative output. The life events described above find representation through the central characters in A Streetcar Named Desire. Williams personally struggled with feelings of loneliness, alcoholism, and depression, and these themes permeate his writing.
Williams has repeatedly claimed, "I am Blanche DuBois" and has identified with her, particularly in terms of a shared hysteria. Also like Blanche, Williams had a tendency to lie. One example of this is Williams's and Blanche's shared propensity to mislead people concerning their age.
Pagan, N. 1993. 'Rethinking Literary Biography: A Postmodern Approach to Tennessee Williams.'
Socio-political context
The play unfolds in the period immediately following the American Civil War. This devastating conflict, fought between Northern and Southern states, centred primarily on the question of slavery abolition. The Southern states opposed abolition because their plantation economies depended entirely on enslaved labour. When the war concluded in 1865 with a Northern victory, slavery was officially abolished. However, despite this defeat, Southern identity and pride remained deeply entrenched. Whilst slavery became illegal, significant emphasis continued to be placed on ancestry and heritage, meaning the racist attitudes that had existed throughout the conflict persisted long after the war's end.
The South became somewhat isolated from the rest of America, developing a reputation as a region dominated by racism and poverty. Although slavery was no longer legal, segregation remained widespread, perpetuating a system of cheap labour based on racial discrimination. However, following the Great Depression, New Orleans emerged as a beacon of diversity and acceptance within these Southern states. A substantial influx of immigrants from Europe and Africa transformed New Orleans into a cultural melting pot. This demographic shift was driven by the transition to an industrial economy, with numerous factories established to replace the old agricultural community. Alongside this economic transformation, a distinct working class emerged.
The clock in A Streetcar Named Desire is Stella's pregnancy ... It is no accident that the day the Kowalski baby – the postwar hybrid of Stanley and Stella – is born is also the day that the representative of the antebellum South, Blanche, is defeated, raped and destroyed. Williams casts something of a cold eye on the triumph of a new (postwar) South peopled by brutish and insensitive Stanley Kowalskis.
Wertheim.A. 2004. 'Staging the War: American Drama and World War II'
Williams sets A Streetcar Named Desire in this "Deep South", presenting two contrasting aspects of the region:
- Mississippi and traditional ways: Represented through the upper-class Dubois family heritage, showcasing intolerance towards difference and the "Other"
- New Orleans (Elysian Fields): Showcasing a more liberal South, characterized by diversity and acceptance
Socio-economic context
A Streetcar Named Desire examines a period of significant transition for the American South, exploring the tensions arising from the shift away from old wealth towards modernity and diversity. Blanche and Stella's money would probably have originated from slavery, and Blanche embodies the struggle of being trapped in the past, unable to adapt to a progressing society. Her conflict with Stanley stems from their fundamentally different values, with many of her insults towards him implying a sense of coarseness and vulgarity associated with his status as a working-class immigrant.
The evolving context of the South formed part of a broader shift towards modernity during the twentieth century. Following the abolition of slavery in the South in 1865, as a consequence of the Civil War, families like the Dubois experienced decline. Twentieth-century America became increasingly centred on the concept of the American Dream, welcoming successive generations of immigrants, like Stanley, who felt inherently all-American.
Stanley represents this dream and the ambitious drive of working-class people who believed they could achieve their desires through determination, hard work, and individualism. This promise fundamentally contradicts everything that enables Blanche to maintain her Southern belle fantasy.
This individualistic, all-American ideology was heavily reinforced by the Second World War. Although Williams rarely explicitly mentions the war, it remains ever-present in his themes and characterisation. The war facilitated the development of a sense of American heroism, based on overcoming the Great Depression and defeating Nazi Germany. A national spotlight shone on working-class men like Stanley, who had survived the war, rejoined the peacetime workforce, and were now celebrated as bearers of American hard-working spirit.
Socio-cultural context
I have only one major theme for my work, which is the destructive power of society on the sensitive, non-conformist individual.
-Tennessee Williams
Gender roles
A Streetcar Named Desire is frequently regarded as a play that critiques the restrictions that post-war American society imposed on itself. Whilst Williams explicitly focuses on the limitations placed on women, the play also implicitly addresses the gender stereotyping that men experienced.
The post-war emergence of American heroism had significant implications for the promotion of masculinity. The nation embraced values centred around family and home life, celebrating returning servicemen and assigning women like Stella to more domestic roles alongside them.
During the Second World War, the proportion of women participating in the national workforce rose from 27% to 37%. However, after the war concluded, they were pushed back into traditional domestic roles.
Williams' post-war New Orleans, therefore, represents a space where traditional gender roles had been disrupted and conservative Southern ideals of old money and aristocratic heritage had been displaced in favour of the new working-class work ethic. Williams establishes conventional gender stereotypes and yet manipulates the concepts of masculine and feminine energy through his characters. Whilst Stella and Stanley generally portray the accepted societal gender roles, Blanche demonstrates masculine energy through her sexuality and arrogance, whilst Mitch and Allan Grey are used to showcase sensitivity, a supposedly "feminine" trait. What becomes evident throughout the plot is that societal gender norms negatively impact all the main characters in the play, driving them towards either death, mental breakdown, or moral destruction.
Race
New Orleans is a cosmopolitan city where there is a relatively warm and easy intermingling of races.
- A Streetcar Named Desire, stage directions, Scene One
The stage directions quoted above are essential to understanding the play. America in the 1940s was certainly not free of racial prejudice and discrimination. This social context proves important to the setting because Williams' New Orleans becomes a distinctive pocket, distinguished from the rest of the region by its warmth and welcoming attitude towards the New American Dream of equality – a dream accessible to all classes and races. Consequently, Blanche arrives as a stranger in New Orleans, bringing with her traditional notions of superiority.
Whilst the main characters are all white, references to "Negro woman", "Mexican women", language variations, slang, dialects, and jazz music work together to create a feeling of diversity and Otherness. The play does not directly address the glaring racism against African-Americans prevalent at that time. However, Williams examines racism faced by recent European immigrants compared to longer established ones through the Kowalski-DuBois conflict.
The relationship between Blanche and Stanley demonstrates the prejudice many first or second-generation Europeans encountered. Blanche refers to him as a "polack" (Scene Eight) and "swine" (Scene 10). These appellations, alongside statements like "You healthy Polack, without a nerve in your body" (Scene Eight), reveal Blanche's racism or xenophobia.
In late nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century America, 'new immigrants' from Italy, Ireland, Poland, Greece, Hungary, and the Slavic countries occupied the lowest racial middle ground and were considered 'not-quite-white'.
However, Stanley predominantly faces prejudice as a consequence of his class position, rather than his ethnic Otherness or ambiguity. This distinction is important to note when discussing the play as a commentary on racism, as at the time, racism in America relating to skin colour was predominant. Thus, A Streetcar Named Desire successfully addresses prejudice based on class rather than race, particularly in a post-Harlem Renaissance era where segregation remained prevalent but was being contested.
Religion and morality
America was founded on Puritan and other Christian principles. These principles permeated culture and beliefs, evolving over time. Whilst the play does not explicitly discuss religion, the prejudice against homosexuality and ideas about sexual immorality stem from the Christian principles upon which America was built. The idea that a wife must submit to her husband is a biblical principle as well, advocated particularly in twentieth-century America, especially in the Southern states. America, post-Depression and post-war, desperately tried to revert to "old-fashioned values" drawn from Christian principles.
Whilst Williams does not explicitly address religion, he does address the issue of morality as understood by American society. Blanche is portrayed struggling with the moral standards that society thrusts upon her. She appears to convince herself even though she is aware of her deceit, persuading herself that she never "lied in [her] heart" (Scene Nine) and was never "deliberat[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 she is left feeling defiled (which she tries to cope with through bathing), whilst Stanley escapes consequences for domestic abuse and rape.
Bert Cardullo sees Streetcar, then, as a Christian tragedy, the impetus of Blanche's destruction coming not from Stanley nor from her denial of her husband's homosexuality, but from his suicide, which she feels was the result of her denial.
- Jac Tharpe, Tennessee Williams: A Tribute.
Literary and critical context
The play received varied responses when it first premiered on Broadway. Some rejected the bold portrayal of sexuality, morality, and desire, but it also became extremely popular amongst audiences who felt the crude realism was admirable. Robert J. Leeney, the editorial writer of the Register, called Williams an "ultra-realist" who was blunt in his ideas and did not overlook basic human needs and behaviour. Many critics consistently compared his play to The Glass Menagerie, but unlike The Glass Menagerie, it was deemed far graver.
Some critics and audiences viewed Stanley as a victim of Blanche's madness and attack against his masculinity, class, and heritage. The rape scene, in this interpretation, is justified as an event initiated by Blanche through her flirting and exhibitionism. It was reported that some audiences actively cheered during Blanche's rape.
Marxist Interpretation
Through a Marxist lens, Stanley appears as the reigning champion of the working classes. He defeats the old aristocratic ways by removing Blanche, the symbol of the Bourgeois class, from their lives and moves on to live with his wife and newborn son, symbols of his future.
This interpretation can be extended using the Darwinian concept of 'survival of the fittest'—Stanley, described as 'the gaudy seed bearer' by Williams (Scene One), emerges as the survivor at the end, ready to pass his way of life down to his new-born child as he defeats the final remnants of the Bourgeois threat to his life—Blanche. Albert Wertheim, professor and author, considers the baby as a representation of a Kowalski future rather than a DuBois one; Blanche is removed from the picture whilst Stanley remains—his final victory.
Feminist Interpretation
This interpretation directly contrasts understanding the play from a feminist lens. The play, when viewed from a feminist perspective, is a critique of the expectations of patriarchal society, expressed through the psychological unravelling of characters. Williams' nuanced portrayal of masculinity and femininity can be understood in this light as well, particularly using Blanche, who tends to display masculine energy which in turn becomes a threat to Stanley, the established Alpha male and Patriarch.
The rape of Blanche, through this feminist lens, becomes a scene where Stanley asserts his masculine power and authority over Blanche through sexual violence. He uses her past decisions against her, a past that is unacceptable because she is a woman. This entire event, in feminist discourse, portrays women as victims of the oppressive patriarchy. The patriarchy and its norms recurrently chipped at Blanche's sanity as she felt she needed to find a husband to be accepted by society.
As we cannot fully accept or reject Blanche, when she is eliminated we don't fully sympathize nor do we rejoice fully
- Klara Bodis, "Blanche: A Complexity of Attitudes"
Production history
Williams published A Streetcar Named Desire in 1947, in the aftermath of the Second World War. A Streetcar Named Desire became popular because of the taboo themes of class tensions, female sexuality, homosexuality, and male domination—all of which coexisted with the social dilemmas of the time. Post-war America (following both civil and world wars) was a fragmented and evolving nation in many respects, and Tennessee Williams critically explores the social tensions and psychological subdivisions of class structures and gender roles through the clash of characters.
John Gronsbeck-Tedesco notes that [Brando's] poses and gestures copied the confident, coiled, often bare-chested images of American soldiers during the war... As either a violent soldier or a desperate hedonist, Brando/Kowalski is an empty shell, held together by kinaesthetic body language learned in the military or in the consumption of goods. This presence needs constant sensation to starve off depression.
McConachie.B.A. 2005. 'American Theater in the Culture of the Cold War.'
Many viewed the play as exposing the moral decay of 'Old South[ern]' values of rigid social hierarchy, aristocracy, culture, and etiquette versus the 'New South[ern]' values that embodied a Darwinian, survival-of-the-fittest struggle of the American Dream. At the time of the first performance in 1974, common knowledge, social norms, and the audience reception would have looked extremely different. At this time, Stanley in many ways symbolised the world of masculinity and fierce individualism. Many observed women's unjust subservience and suffering, and these were contested by a burgeoning feminist movement.
The Broadway Premiere
On 3rd December 1947, Broadway staged A Streetcar Named Desire for the first time. The performance concluded with a brief, surprised silence before a thunder of applause, lasting 30 minutes, erupted. With over 800 performances across America, Marlon Brando became a star overnight, whilst Williams won a Pulitzer Prize for Drama and Jessica Tandy (the actress who played Blanche) won a Tony award.
In 1951, the same director, Elia Kazan, transformed the play into a film, with Williams writing the screenplay. There was significant controversy over the rape scene, and Williams stood his ground, refusing to remove it. As a consequence, in the movie, dictated by the Catholic Legion of Decency, Stanley is punished on-screen as Stella leaves him.
The theatre production
Williams uses eleven scenes rather than acts to unfold his story, with no indicated breaks for an interval. Speculation exists about his reasons for this choice. He may have selected this unconventional structure because he felt that his particular talent was for writing short, one-act plays, and that he could not sustain dramatic tension for three acts of conventional length—a tension that is enhanced by the lack of an interval.
Language and dialogue are fundamental to characterisation, clearly depicting differences in upbringing and class. Even in stage directions, he uses rich imagery to detail characterisation. Staging and directions carry A Streetcar Named Desire as a play. Williams uses a mixed approach of expressionism in the portrayal of reality. Expressionism can be understood as the representation of reality in an abstract form.
When a play employs unconventional techniques it should not be trying to escape its responsibility of dealing with reality...but should be attempting to find a closer approach, a more penetrating and vivid expression of things as they are...
- Tennessee Williams
Key Theatrical Elements
Williams uses stage directions to give very specific instructions on sounds, symbols, sets, and props. For example:
- He recurrently uses stage directions to establish Elysian Fields as multicultural and vibrant
- The setting of the Kowalski apartment and the street outside is designed so that movements between the two spaces are seamless, with the life of the street seeping into the apartment
- The Mexican flower vendor from the streets is a symbol of death adding to Blanche's mental breakdown
- The rape that occurs within the apartment as the prostitute and drunkard on the street argue creates concurrent events that intensify the audience's sense of the harsh reality of life in Elysian Fields
The boundaries between the public and private spheres are distorted here, which connects to the larger theme of society's control on individuality.
Williams also uses costumes and props to add to symbols, thematic concerns, and characterisation—be it Blanche's paper lantern, tattered faux furs, and cheap jewellery to reflect her false glamour, or the use of denim to indicate working-classness. Williams' use of lighting is also detailed and symbolic as he contrasts light with darkness. Shades of light and darkness mirror and enhance the mood of the scene but also aid with characterisation, particularly with Blanche and her affinity for darkness.
Williams also uses music as a theatrical device. Modernist music and jazz is used to create the setting. The Varsouviana Polka reflects Blanche's guilt-induced mental deterioration. This song plays a vital role in her characterisation and transports the audience seamlessly into her delusions and then back to reality—the use of loud noises is also evident in creating the contrasting reality. Additionally, jungle noises are used to reflect the brutal, primal events of the play, mainly surrounding Stanley.
Williams' creative use of every aspect in theatre production—music, sets, props, costumes, etc.—is what marks him as one of the greatest playwrights in history.
The film
Williams wrote the screenplay for the film adaptation of the drama, and in his version, themes and dialogues predominantly remained the same. Most changes were the consequence of censorship; whilst many important segments were filmed and edited in, they were cut before release and most were made without the knowledge of the director and writer, much to their discontent. The Hollywood Production Code and the National Legion of Decency played the key roles in censorship, cutting out segments they deemed "inappropriate for viewing". Two versions of the film exist—the first 1951 version experienced maximum censorship, whilst the 1993 version saw more of the original script and filming.
Major Changes and Censorship
Here are some segments and dialogues that were removed or changed:
| Content | Changes and Reasons |
|---|---|
| Conversations and plot events about homosexuality | Homosexuality was deemed as not a "correct standard of life" and so it was changed. In the movie, Allan Grey was called "weak" by Blanche who "lost respect for him" because he could not retain any job he attempted. This is what leads him to shoot himself. |
| Blanche's drunkenness or flirtations (Mitch and young man) | Inappropriate behaviour for women. |
| Any verbal abuse toward Stanley about his immigrant status or sub-human nature | Deemed as discrimination |
| Stella's defence of Stanley's abuse | Deemed as immoral and inappropriate behaviour (this was readded in the second version of the movie) |
| Stella and Stanley's intimate conversations | Deemed as inappropriate for viewing |
| "intimacies with strangers [were] all I seemed able to fill my empty heart with" (Scene Nine) | Intimacies was changed to "meetings" |
| "On Sunday nights they would go in town to get drunk –" (Scene Nine) | Sunday was changed to Saturday, as drinking on a holy day or the Sabbath day was frowned upon. |
| "is sinful, then let me be damned for it!" (Scene Nine) | Damned is changed to "punished". Words like "hell" and "damn" were removed from the entire film. |
When A Streetcar Named Desire was first released, it created a firestorm of controversy. It was immoral, decadent, vulgar and sinful, its critics cried. And that was after substantial cuts had already been made in the picture, at the insistence of Warner Bros., driven on by the industry's own censors. Elia Kazan, who directed the film, fought the cuts and lost. For years the missing footage - only about five minutes in length, but crucial - was thought lost. But this 1993 restoration splices together Kazan's original cut, and we can see how daring the film really was.
- Roger Ebert (film critic)
Key Points to Remember:
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Context is essential for AO3: Understanding the circumstances surrounding the play's creation and reception accounts for approximately 24% of your examination marks. Always integrate context relevantly throughout your responses, not as an afterthought.
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Williams' personal experiences shaped the play: His difficult childhood, alcoholic father, Southern Belle mother, sister's mental illness, and his own homosexuality in an intolerant era all influenced his characterisation and themes in A Streetcar Named Desire.
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The play examines post-Civil War tensions: Set in the aftermath of the American Civil War, the play explores the clash between Old South values (represented by Blanche and the DuBois heritage) and New South diversity (represented by Stanley and New Orleans), alongside the emergence of the American Dream and working-class identity.
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Gender, race, and morality are key themes: The play critiques societal limitations imposed on both men and women, addresses prejudice based on class rather than race, and examines double standards in sexual morality that fall more heavily on women.
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Critical interpretations vary significantly: The play can be understood through different lenses—Marxist readings view Stanley as a working-class champion, whilst feminist readings interpret the play as a critique of patriarchal oppression. The 1947 Broadway production and 1951 film adaptation faced controversy, with significant censorship of the film's sexual content and references to homosexuality.