Examine the significance of Stella’s pregnancy? (25/25 - 2023 A-level exam)
Examiners comment: Mature, sophisticated argument. Detailed & perceptive KU of
relevant contexts & methods. UB5.
Williams' 1947 Southern Gothic tragedy, A Streetcar Named Desire, uses Stella's
pregnancy as an extended metaphor. The birth of the baby Kowalski symbolises the
decline of the Old South - personified by Blanche and instead the rise of the New
World Industrial society - personified by Stanley. Therefore, Stella's pregnancy is
extremely signifcant as it places her in the middle of these two worlds and ultimately
her choice to choose Stanley in the end, alongside the birth of her baby, contributes
to Blanche's symbolic death. Williams' has Stella's pregnancy ironically conincide
with Stanley's rape of Blanche. Therefore, from the outset it reinforces how the birth
of her baby is effectively the end to Blanche and the Old South.
In scene 10 in the rape, Stanley uses the imperative statement of 'We've had this
date with each other from the beginning!'. On one hand, this can be seen as a sexual
statement, cruelly implying that Blanche led him on from the start and deserved this
violent outcome from the beginning - which even some audiences agreed with,
cheering in the scene. However, perhaps Williams equally uses this as a double
meaning to reflect how it was inevitable that Blanche would either have to face the
reality of the Old South's decline or be removed from the culturally diverse New
Orleans with 'an easy intermingling of races' and industrial new world. The latter is
likely, as Williams too lived in the Old South in Mississipi and was forced to leave,
witnessing its decline - as illustrated in Mitchell's Gone with the Wind with the Tara
platation. Williams presents Blanche as clearly idealising Belle Reve, through her
repeated positive imagery of it - such as its grand 'columns', or white colour
symbolising its innocence - which is clearly untrue as it was likely built from the
exploitation of working class minorities like Stanley Williams continues this idea
through Blanche's Old South beliefs coming to fruition. For instance, Williams uses
an animalistic semantic field whenever Blanche discusses Stanley - calling him
derogatry names such as 'pig', 'subhuman' or an 'ape' - and playing on racial
stereotypes like 'Polack' - which a 1940s audience would understand better that she
is implying he is dumb. These views even influence Stella who starts to adopt this
language. Yet, Williams' metaphor of Stanley saying 'I pulled you down off them
columns' and Stella willingly leaving the Old South to join Stanley through a Marxist
perspective reflects her passitivit, to the uprise of the working class Industrial new
world - which Stanley continues through the rape and seding Blanche to an asylum.
Moreover, arguably Williams' act of raping Blanche and sending her to an asylum
symbolises her death - which is a microcosm of the death of the Old South. Thus,
William's narrative of having the birth of the Kowalski baby at the same time as this
emphasises further that the Old South has now been eradicated from their home -
with the baby in 'blue' arguably symbolising another disruptive masculine elemnt like
Stanley, alongside representing the change that will now happen in their home and
society as a whole, with people like Stanley and Stella rising in status.
Likewise, in their patriarchal 20th century society, Stella's pregnancy automatically
ties her to Stanley. Elia Kazan, the director of the 1947 broadway premier, reflected
this through her belief in Stanislavskian overiding motives: to which Stella's is her
dependency on Stanley. Eunice highlights this when saying to Stella in Scene 11, as
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