A Streetcar Named Desire

             A Streetcar Named Desire is the story of the pathetic mental and emotional collapse of a fragile, delicate Lady of aristocratic descent who is attempting to make one last play at having a meaningful life. Blanche comes from a once-wealthy family of Mississippi planters who has lost everything including the family estate. She has moved to the French Quarter to live with her sister and sister's husband in hopes that she can make a new life.
             Blanches journey is very representative of her downfall in life. She is told to "Take a streetcar named Desire, and then transfer to one called Cemeteries and ride six blocks and get off at Elysian Fields". Later in the story we find out that this has been Blanche's journey for the last few years of her life and that she really is arriving at Elysian Fields.
             We find out that Blanch was married earlier in life, but to a homosexual. The young man commits suicide, apparently form the pressure of Blanche's taunts and Blanche is left without a partner for the rest of her life. However, Blanche is not willing to simply be without. She admits later in the story that, "after the death of Allen, intimacies with strangers was all I seemed able to fill my empty heart with".(679) Blanche apparently has spent the time before coming to New Orleans as a very promiscuous woman and even as a prostitute. This is her ride on Desire.
             The next leg of Blanche's journey is on Cemeteries. Blanche had been a teacher in Laurel but left in the middle of the spring term. Blanche tells Stella that she left on because "my nerves broke. I was on the verge of –lunacy, almost! So Mr. Graves...suggested I take a leave of absence."(635) Mr. Graves is the school superintendent. In her journey of life Mr. Graves sends her on the second leg of her trip. Blanche is not on a leave of absence but instead has been fired. We find out much later that Blanche has ha...

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A Streetcar Named Desire. (1969, December 31). In MegaEssays.com. Retrieved 13:04, March 28, 2024, from https://www.megaessays.com/viewpaper/30613.html