Exam (elaborations)
A* A LEVEL ESSAY ON SETTING IN STREETCAR
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A* A LEVEL ESSAY ON SETTING IN STREETCAR
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Explore how Williams uses setting in Streetcar Named DesirePlan:
1) Setting used for foregrounding stanleys championing over blanche- racial/class
divisions, old south vs new world, house of stella/stanley. Tensions between
socioeconomic, cultural backgrounds, American civil war, old south vs new world,
French quarter is a reflection of post-war America- portrayed as gritty/ decaued,
symbolising decline and desperation some characters experience
2) Symbolism of streetcar routes
3) Confinement and entrapment- blanche’s entrapment in fantasy world- Jungian
psychoanalysis, plastic theatre with the varsouviana polka- symbol of deteriorating
psyche, blanche’s flashbacks, women’s entrapment in marriage- Napoleonic code,
plastic theatre during poker night scene visually contrasts the world of the men with
blanche and stella e.g the stark lighting on the poker game combined with softer, more
fluid lighting around stella and blanche.
In ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’, Williams explores setting as a means for foregrounding the eventual
championing of Stanley’s hegemonic masculinity through the destruction of Blanche’s ‘Southern Belle’
mannerisms and eventual removal from Elysian fields society. This is achieved through the
comparative presentation of Belle Reve and Elysian fields, setting up the central antithesis of racial
and class divisions between their respective inhabitants; the Old South is pitted against the new as
the elegant, aristocratic ‘old’ southern lineage is replaced by a new, industrialised north, backboned
by immigrants. Then, this is furthered through the house of Stella and Stanley, notably comprising
highly cramped quarters which exacerbates tensions throughout, particularly through the struggle over
the bathroom, arguably Blanche’s only space of freedom. Such oppressive conditions irrevocably
intensify Blanche’s psychological disintegration, whose fragile state deteriorates under Stanley’s
persistent scrutiny and lack of privacy, and result in her consequential subjugation to a mental asylum.
Finally, setting is used in order to foreshadow as well as support central themes in the play, as the
titular streetcar passes through cemeteries, revealing the destructive nature of passion and the
inescapability of fate.
One way in which Williams presents setting is as metonymically symbolic of the central antithesis of
the play. The character of Blanche Dubois is one the one hand of this, symbolising the southern belle-
a stock character from the antebellum south who is a woman with privileged upbringing- with her
pretentious “fluffy bodice” and “ear-rings of pearl” comes from Belle Reve, a plantation in Laurel. The
name of this setting means ‘beautiful dream’, a poignant reminder of Blanche’s tendency to cling to
illusions and create “temporary magic”. Yet, the name “belle reve” holds a grammatical mistake, the
adjective belle is feminine yet reve is masculine, thus, underlying the notion that this remnant of the
‘old south’ is disintegrating. This grammatical mistake also implies a certain imperfection, which is
also apparent and true for Blanche’s beautiful dream, her net of lies and false illusions. In keeping
with this, her upbringing being on a plantation alludes to pre-civil war disputes between southern and
northern states, the former of which believed slavery to be fundamental to economic prosperity. This
became an out-dated notion considering the post-war political climate and rise of the ‘american
dream’: the brutish industrial reality of this ‘new’ America was that the working man of any background
could now achieve a kind of upward mobility that was not attainable before.
This use of setting to really build up the fundamental backgrounding of the character Blanche
facilitates the antithesis between herself and her culture relative to Stanley. Stanley’s polish heritage,
promise of assimilation and the condition of the immigrant neighbourhood, elysian fields, which he
occupies stands in total opposition to Blanche and her beliefs. This racial and cultural discourse is
vocalised through Blanche saying “maybe he’s what we need to mix with our blood now that we’ve
lost Belle Reve”; an allusion to the idea of the ‘blue-blooded aristocracy’ and the potential for eugenic
contamination which Stanley’s new authority poses. The reference to Belle Reve here reminds the
audience of the threatened position of Blanche and her Southern families at the hands of the rising
working class. Elysian fields is presented through stage directions which romanticise the “raffish
charm” of the impoverished lifestyles within as well as the ethnic and racial intermingling. The
contrasting impressions given of these two locations and characters from the outset predicts the class
struggle that will partially sustain the conflict between them: Blanche’s false civility versus Stanley’s
brutishness. It is primarily Blanche’s imposition of her culture and degradation of Stanley’s- calling him
“bestial”, “ape-like” and inhuman- as an attempt to exploit her power rooted in her privilege as an
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