Kayla Libuda
March 10, 2009
English Honors III
A Streetcar Named Desire
In the play A Streetcar Named Desire written by Tennessee Williams, Blanche DuBois is portrayed to be both the victim and victimizer of the play depending on how you sympathize with her. After reading the play though, it is clear that she is the victim. She is a bizarre, fragile, and polarizing character who came to New Orleans to live with her sister and brother-in-law, Stella and Stanley, after having nowhere else to turn to. Some may view her in a negative way saying she is the victimizer because of the lies she tells to Stella, Stanley and Mitch throughout the play and her actions towards them, but after analyzing her past and physiological problems you can prove she is the victim.
Blanche grew up in a middle-class family but she lives her life filled with luxuries and fancy looking clothes. She prefers to live through magic rather than reality. This way she doesn’t have to face her problems or past. Her physiological problems all started when Blanche witnessed the suicide of her husband very young. After catching him in bed with another man and calling him “disgusting”, her husband shot himself in the head one evening at a club. After the event of his death Blanche refused help and turned to promiscuity instead. Ever since Blanche has had many “friends” and comes onto every guy she is alone with. Losing a loved one to not only another man but to death is a tragic event in a person’s life. So by blaming her actions in New Orleans on the death is completely acceptable because if you were in her shoes many would act the same and try to hide from the past like Blanche does.
Blanche also comes across as a victim because of her deception. Throughout the play she tells lies to everyone around her like Stella, Stanley, and Mitch. This makes not only the others but herself believe she lives in a fantasy world and not reality. By telling lies, Blanche doesn’t have to face her brutal present or past life events. When Blanche told her first lie, that she was taking a leave of absence from her teaching job back in Laurel, instead of being fired for having relations with a student, it began to lead to lie after lie and never ended until Stanley and the others caught onto her forcing Blanche to see through her dreams and face the harsh realities of life.
Thirdly, Blanche uses her sexuality to get through situations that she feels uncomfortable in and would rather not face. When Blanche is alone with another man she turns on her promiscuity and becomes quiet flirtatious to feel wanted and beautiful like when the young paper boy stops by or when alone with Stanley. From the beginning of the play, Blanche flirts with almost every man and by the end; it resulted in Stanley raping her because there was so much sexual tension between the two.
In the end Blanche is admitted to a Mental Institution because her family and friends did not believe she was raped or that she was sane for she would only live in her own fantasy world. Blanche went through many hard times in her life from losing her job, her family estate Bell Reve, her husband’s death and receiving a shameful reputation from it all. Due to those events from her past Blanche became a victim quickly in the play and it is just that she is portrayed as one. Her living in her own little world and being the liar and conniving, story-telling women that she grew to be, is no reason to say she is the victimizer and deserved what she got in the end.
