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In the Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams there is a since of fantasy and escape among the characters. They all live in there own type of world. Tom Wingfield, our narrator’s sister Laura is in a crippled world of her own. She lives in a world where it consist of phonography records and her favorite glass animals, she lives in a world of confinement and dependency. Amanda Wingfield, Tom’s mother lives in a world of the past, she feels trapped by the life she was given. She did not choose to be left with her two children alone not being able to enjoy life. She escapes to her world of her gentlemen callers to forget about it all. Tom Wingfiled lives in a world of movies and writing, but among all these characters, there is one character who has managed to escape the desperate and…
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The Glass Menagerie is a wonderful autobiographical play written by Tennessee Williams. The play is placed in the 1930s in St. Louis. The play is a memory from Tennessee Williams; he explains that since its from memory there may be some unreliable information given. Throughout the story there is several uses of symbolism, including the glass menagerie, the Wingfield’s fire escape, and pleurosis.…
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Tennessee Williams', The Glass Menagerie, is a play that evokes great sympathy and in some cases, empathy for a protagonist who struggles to overcome two opposing forces; his responsibilities and his desires. There are many symbols and non-liner references that contribute to the development of characterization, dramatic tensions and the narrative. This essay will examine in detail, the aspects of the play that contribute to the development of the above mentioned elements.…
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While reading the play The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, the reader quickly learns of a, sadly, typical tale of family strife. In this play a family struggles to find the way out of their secluded, seemingly solitary life. Amanda Wingfield, the mother of Tom and Laura, only craves for the best for her kids. However, this ostensibly adoring mother puts Toms needs at the bottom of list. As a family without a father figure Tom, being the only boy, steps up to help his mother and sister. Striving to live up to his father’s memory, Tom helps by paying for the rent while putting his personal goals on hold. The Wingfield family goes through much trouble and strife portraying the sad truth of what goes on in the everyday family and home.…
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The Glass MenagerieThe story is about Amanda Wingfield who is a middle-aged woman and an incurable romantic. Abandoned by her spouse and obligated to live in lifeless lower-middle-class environment, she runs away from reality into the fantasy world of her youth. Amanda is the neurotic mother incapable of letting go of the genteel courting ways of her Southern upbringing. She loves her children intensely, however, by her continuous nagging, her never-ending retelling of romantic stories of her youth, and her failure to face the realities of life she stifles her daughter, Laura, and drive off her son, Tom. (McGlinn 511)In the very first scene, she annoys Tom by constantly telling him how to eat who says: "I haven 't enjoyed one bite of this dinner because of your constant directions on how to eat it." (Williams 4) On the very dinner table she goes on to tell her children the stories of her girlhood which the readers are told have been told by her a number of time already. "My callers were gentlemen - all! Among my callers were some of the most prominent young planters of the Mississippi Delta - planters and sons of planters!" (Williams 5-6)The Glass Menagerie is said to be an autobiographical work by Tennessee Williams. According to the author, it is a "memory play." In the story are delineated many personal and societal problems, for instance, the difficulties faced by single mothers and the intricacies a disability might create…
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In The Glass Menagerie, Tennessee Williams utilizes the characters in such a way, that Tom is not only a character, but he is also the narrator, the father is in the play but only figuratively, but his character can also be seen through Tom “ I’m like my father. The bastard son of a bastard! see how he grins and he’s been absent going on sixteen years!” ( Williams Pg. 483) . There is also another character and that is Jim, Jim is one of Tom’s friends and he is seen as a gentleman caller by Amanda, yet he engaged to his high school sweetheart he is also see as a very sweet person “people are not so dreadful when you get to know them. That’s what you have to remember and everybody has problems not just you, but practically everybody has got some problems,…
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“The Glass Menagerie” by the famous American playwright Tennessee Williams is well-known for its lyrical tone and poetic power. The play is about love and understanding, inner isolation and desire to escape, when the main characters have their own paths to follow. Tennessee Williams depicts a true-to-life picture of the family survival with their mutual care and tenderness, but at the same time pressure and home violence. The events are presented by one of the main characters, Tom Wingfield, who lives with his mother and a crippled sister, and because of their father’s financial problems it is Tom who has to take care of others. In fact, he dreams to quit his tiring job at a shoe warehouse and become a poet, but being unable to do it, he starts…
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The Glass Menagerie is a “memory play” and it was the first of its' kind. To achieve this type of play, Tennessee Williams included many, precise stage directions in his script. The stage directions-lighting, music, pictures on a screen-were important factors in setting the play apart and making it the success that it was. In the 1973 movie remake however, a lot of these stage directions were ignored, such as the pictures on a screen, the lighting and the focus on characters. This stripped the play of its individuality, leaving it plain and very lacking.…
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The world is a very mysterious place with its constant advancements and how it is always evolving, but to some people this world may be considered a scary place. This fear of the outside world has the ability to make those who fear it unable to accept reality. In Tennessee Williams play The Glass Menagerie, the thought of accepting reality is especially hard for the Wingfield family, Laura, Tom, and Amanda, causing them to close themselves off each in their own unique way.…
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From having unfulfilled desires to abandoning loved ones, Tennessee Williams encompasses both aspects in his most successful piece of literature that will be examined for generations to come. The struggles of Laura are displayed perfectly by Tom’s memory in respect to her shyness and incapability of forming into society because of a disability yet this play is much more than just finding likely suitors. In The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, the characters Tom and his father are compared with each other in a fight against destiny. Both characters are faced with the struggles of a transitioning South being revolutionized into an industrial movement sweeping the world. Confronted by the same struggles of a typical Southern…
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Tennessee Williams’ play The Glass Menagerie gives readers a look into a truly dysfunctional family. At first it could seem as if their lives are anything but normal, but Amanda’s “impulse to preserve her single-parent family seems as familiar as the morning newspaper” (Presley 53). The Wingfields are a typical family just struggling to get by. Their problems, however, stem from their inability to effectively communicate with each other. Instead of talking out their differences, they resort to desperate acts. The desperation that the Wingfields embrace has led them to create illusions in their minds and in turn become deceptive. Amanda, Tom, and Laura are caught up in a web of desperation, denial, and deception, and it is this entrapment that prevents them, as it would any family, from living productive and emotionally fulfilling lives together.…
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The Glass Menagerie is a production that relates to the issue of abandonment within the Wingfield’s family. Since the father of the household has deserted his family his son, Tom, is forced to fill his shoes as the man of the house. Tom’s mother, Amanda, is the primary reason behind Tom’s obligations. He must work to take care of sister, Laura, as well. Since she is casted as a disabled individual all of the pressure is on Tom to financially assist his family. In order to get away from the reality he deems desirable, he escapes into a world of alcohol and movies.…
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The purpose of this paper is to introduce and analyze the play “The Glass Menagerie” by…
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"The Glass Menagerie" is a play written by Tennessee Williams. The play is semi-autobiographical, told from the point of view of the writer. It is a memory play set in the home the Wingfield family. The play is about a young man, Tom, who lives with his mother, Amanda and his sister, Laura. The play explores the various struggles of each individual during the great depression. The characters all have their flaws and motives which help us to understand them and sympathise or agree with them. All the characters in the play behave in some sort of obsessive manner; however, Amanda behaves most strongly this way.…
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In The Glass Menagerie, family means obligations. This play raises questions of duty and responsibility to your other family members, and for the most part in gender specific roles. We see that it is the job of the male to bring home money, and the daughter to look pretty and get married. This also features the notion of abandonment, as a father leaves the family behind. There is also the notion of children taking after their parents; Tom leaves the family just as his father did, and Amanda wishes her daughter were as popular as she used to be. We see fighting between mother and son over both trivial matters, such as dinner etiquette, and larger issues, such as work and life goals. Lastly, this play examines the relationship between sister and brother, as Tom feels both protective and later regret with regards to his sister Laura.…
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