Desire and Death in "A Streetcar Named Desire"
Shan Jafri
Ms. Tufano
AP English- D Period
13 November 2013
Desire and Death in A Streetcar Named Desire In A Streetcar Named Desire, Blanche refuses to accept reality and tries to resuscitate her idealized past through memory. She allows desire to conduct the way she lives and as a matter of fact is ultimately destroyed by the pursuit of her sexual desires. The correlation between death and desire is a prominent aspect that Williams explores in A Streetcar Named Desire. Throughout the play, death and desire are frequently and consistently entwined on many levels, particularly in the connotation of sexual desire inevitably leading to death or extreme wreckage of some kind and vice versa. The parallelism between death and desire is first exhibited promptly after the commencement of the play. In the play, an actual streetcar named “Desire” takes Blanche to the Kowalski’s. In Scene One, she explains to Eunice “they told [her] to take a street-car named Desire, and then transfer to one called Cemeteries and ride six blocks and get off at–Elysian Fields!” (Williams 6). William’s diction Desire, then Cemeteries, then Elysian Fields alludes to the corresponding sequence: sex, then death, then the afterlife. This seemingly linear progression blatantly proposes that desire ushers death. Desire leads to death not only for Blanche but for others as well. After Blanche’s former husband was found having sex with an older man, he committed suicide out of shame. Blanche’s husband’s sexual desire ultimately culminated in his death. Blanche’s own good reputation also meets its end as a result of her promiscuous behavior and infidelities at the Flamingo Hotel. The death of her husband leads her to employ desire in order to escape death. After Blanche engaged in an affair with a high school student of hers, her boss, Mr. Graves, fired her. Her boss’s name, Mr. Graves, is yet another manifestation that advocates the link between death and desire and pertains to the
Ms. Tufano
AP English- D Period
13 November 2013
Desire and Death in A Streetcar Named Desire In A Streetcar Named Desire, Blanche refuses to accept reality and tries to resuscitate her idealized past through memory. She allows desire to conduct the way she lives and as a matter of fact is ultimately destroyed by the pursuit of her sexual desires. The correlation between death and desire is a prominent aspect that Williams explores in A Streetcar Named Desire. Throughout the play, death and desire are frequently and consistently entwined on many levels, particularly in the connotation of sexual desire inevitably leading to death or extreme wreckage of some kind and vice versa. The parallelism between death and desire is first exhibited promptly after the commencement of the play. In the play, an actual streetcar named “Desire” takes Blanche to the Kowalski’s. In Scene One, she explains to Eunice “they told [her] to take a street-car named Desire, and then transfer to one called Cemeteries and ride six blocks and get off at–Elysian Fields!” (Williams 6). William’s diction Desire, then Cemeteries, then Elysian Fields alludes to the corresponding sequence: sex, then death, then the afterlife. This seemingly linear progression blatantly proposes that desire ushers death. Desire leads to death not only for Blanche but for others as well. After Blanche’s former husband was found having sex with an older man, he committed suicide out of shame. Blanche’s husband’s sexual desire ultimately culminated in his death. Blanche’s own good reputation also meets its end as a result of her promiscuous behavior and infidelities at the Flamingo Hotel. The death of her husband leads her to employ desire in order to escape death. After Blanche engaged in an affair with a high school student of hers, her boss, Mr. Graves, fired her. Her boss’s name, Mr. Graves, is yet another manifestation that advocates the link between death and desire and pertains to the
Cited: Hurrell, John D. Two Modern American Tragedies: Reviews and Criticism of Death of a Salesman and A Streetcar Named Desire. New York: Charles Scribner 's Sons, 1961. Print. Scribner Research Anthologies. Marotous, George. "A Streetcar Named Desire l Critical Commentary." A Streetcar Named Desire l Critical Commentary. Melbourne High School, 2006. Web. Williams, Tennessee. A Streetcar Named Desire. New York: New Directions Publishing Corporation, 2004. Print.