"THE GLASS MENAGERIE & A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cliff Notes)

Meanwhile, Blanche, distraught and frightened, has organized a hasty escape upstairs to Eunice's with Stella in tow.

Soon Stanley emerges dripping. Somehow his meanness has vanished. Now he's like a vulnerable little boy almost in tears, crying for his baby, his Stella. Half dressed, he stumbles outside to the front pavement and howls again and again, "Stella! Stella!" Eunice warns him to leave her alone, but after a time Stella comes out the door and slips down the stairs to Stanley. The two embrace. Stanley then lifts her and carries her into the dark flat.

Does it surprise you to see Stella return to Stanley so soon after he abused her? Obviously, she loves him desperately. Perhaps she is aroused by Stanley's bestiality.

NOTE: Williams learned a good deal about uninhibited sexuality from the writings of the English novelist D. H. Lawrence (1885-1930). An artist-rebel, Lawrence scorned conventional sexual behavior. Williams, himself a sexual nonconformist, admired both Lawrence and his work. One of Williams' plays, I Rise in Flame, Cried the Phoenix, is based on the last days of Lawrence's life.

Blanche seems shaken by Stanley's outburst. Mitch returns and tries to comfort her. Together, they smoke a cigarette. Apparently still dazed and confused by what she had witnessed, Blanche thanks Mitch for his kindness.

^^^^^^^^^^A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE: SCENE FOUR

The next morning Stella, tired but evidently content after a night of love, lies peacefully in bed. Blanche expresses dismay over last night's brawl, but Stella objects. It's scarcely worth speaking of. Anyway, all is forgiven because Stanley felt ashamed afterwards.

Stella admits to her sister that Stanley's brutish manner appeals to her. In fact, it's rather thrilling. Stella recounts the excitement of her wedding night when Stanley charged around the apartment breaking lightbulbs with the heel of her shoe. How might Blanche have reacted in a like situation?

You've already seen Blanche treating Stella tactlessly. But now she becomes downright cruel. Stanley is a madman, she says, and if Stella had any sense, she'd leave him immediately.

To understand Stella, you might ask why she chooses to stay with her ill-tempered husband. Is she a model of broad-mindedness? Or is she a weakling? Or has she become a fatalist, that is, someone who just accepts her lot in life? As you'll see later, Stella's personality and values will help to seal Blanche's fate.

Blanche urges Stella to come away with her. She proposes opening a shop of some kind with money provided by Shep Huntleigh, a rich acquaintance. Although Shep may be only a figment of her imagination, Blanche starts to write him a telegram: "Sister and I in desperate situation...." In truth, of course, the despair is all Blanche's.

For Stella most of life's anxieties and troubles are made trivial by what she calls the "things that happen between a man and a woman in the dark." Stella calls it love, but Blanche terms it "brutal desire" and begins to address Stella on the subject of Stanley's bestiality. Blanche, as though a spokesman for civilization, talks of man's noble accomplishments in art and poetry. All that, she says, has passed Stanley by. Blanche ends with a passionate plea: "Don't--don't hang back with the brutes!"

NOTE: Blanche's speech illustrates one of the play's major conflicts, a symbolic clash between civilization and barbarism. By the end of the scene, you'll be able to chalk up a victory for one of them.

After Blanche finishes, Stanley reveals that he'd overheard the whole conversation. Stella's moment of decision has come. Will she be swayed by Blanche's eloquence? Stanley's grin of triumph, flashed at Blanche over Stella's shoulder, suggests that it was really no contest.

^^^^^^^^^^A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE: SCENE FIVE

To keep her hope alive, or at least to keep up the pretense of hope, Blanche composes a letter to Shep Huntleigh, informing him that she intends to make room in her crowded social life to visit him in Dallas.

NOTE: Regardless of whether Shep is imaginary or real, to Blanche he represents a chance to be rescued from her plight. He's a savior, a symbol of a vanishing breed--the gallant, romantic, and wealthy Southern gentleman. More than likely, such a man is Blanche's mirage. Earlier you heard her rage against the real Southern gentlemen she knew.

While Blanche reads a piece of the letter to Stella, you hear angry shouts and curses from upstairs. Steve and Eunice are embroiled in one of their periodic arguments. Later they make up and, like Stella and Stanley after the poker game, clasp each other fiercely. Have you noticed the characters' fluctuating emotions? Rapidly, their joy may turn to anger or anger to joy. They hit emotional peaks and valleys in swift succession. Could these fluctuations signify the characters' instability? Or do they suggest, as some critics have noted, the rhythms of sexual passion?

Some time after, Stanley startles Blanche by mentioning a certain man named Shaw from Laurel. Shaw claims to have met a woman named Blanche at Laurel's Hotel Flamingo, a seedy place frequented by the town's lowlife. Stanley stops short of calling Blanche a whore, but he strongly implies that Blanche is something other than an English teacher. Blanche denies it, of course, but nervousness gives her away.

While Blanche might like Stella as a confidante, someone to whom she can unburden herself, it's not a role Stella savors. However, Blanche asks Stella for advice about Mitch, soon to arrive for another evening out. Like a young girl just starting to date, Blanche asks how freely she can grant sexual favors and still retain her beau's respect. For a teenager the question is a puzzlement. For a grown woman, whose career includes a spell as town whore, the problem is both comic and tragic, but important nevertheless.

NOTE: The further you explore the play, the more psychological turns and byways you'll discover. By now the play has turned almost into a psychological drama, recalling works by Chekhov, the Russian playwright, who let characters unveil their mental processes without help from a narrator or from the remarks of other characters. You understand the inner being of characters almost solely from the words they say. In his later years Tennessee Williams often acknowledged Chekhov's influence on his work.

Soon after Stella and Stanley leave for the evening, a boy of about high school age comes to collect for the newspaper. Blanche makes advances. She flirts with him, and finally, to the boy's astonishment, plants a kiss on his mouth. Afterwards she mutters, "It would be nice to keep you, but I've got to be good--and keep my hands off children." Blanche says the words as though she's recalling her past, suggesting perhaps that she's had encounters with children before.

Why does she kiss the young man? Is she a sexual deviant? Does the encounter make her feel young? Is she testing her seductive powers? Later, after you learn more about Blanche's past, you might develop additional theories. Similarly, you might ponder the boy's response. Was he stunned with surprise? Did he submit out of courtesy?

Blanche's brush with the boy has buoyed her morale. Moments later, Mitch arrives bearing a bouquet of roses. Coquettishly she presses the flowers to her lips and calls Mitch her "Rosenkavalier."

NOTE: The central moment in the Richard Strauss opera Der Rosenkavalier is the presentation of a silver rose to a beautiful young woman. The allusion certainly goes way over Mitch's head, but he catches the spirit of Blanche's words and smiles appreciatively.