Itallics In Streetcar

Tennessee Williams uses italics as a author would use imagery. He uses his italics to paint pictures for the reader of the play, in ways that most plays do not. Williams uses the italics to make sure that no small detail is left untouched by the reader's mind. He uses them to draw scenes through sound, scent and sight. He sets up mood and stage directions in ways that wouldn't be expected from a play script, but from a director.

First of all, Williams uses his italics to give us insight into the characters that, as a reader, we wouldn't get. Plays are mostly written to be watched, and through that logic, it is likely that we will never see physical attributes of characters, or how the playwright wanted them to be seen. This means that we lose some of the idea that the playwright had behind some of the characters. Williams makes it possible for us to see his every intention for what the characters looked like. This allows a reader, who hasn't seen the play, to understand what Williams intends to be seen on stage. This helps the reader to understand the play so much more, especially in a play that is as character driven as Streetcar.

Not only this, but Williams uses the italics to show what each character can smell, hear and see, something that makes the play more easily read, something which is integral to the way Williams presents the play. Not only does it help the play's readability, but it also helps a director to stage the play, how Williams would have wanted it to be. Again, this shows how much care Williams had towards his plays. He never directed a play, and therefore felt that by writing stage directions down in such detail, he was able to get across the message that he wanted to be seen by the audience, something which would have normally been difficult without directing the play himself.

Poker and Bathing

Poker in The Streetcar Named Desire is a symbol used in a variety of ways. Firstly, it shows Stanley as an alpha male. The first game of poker introduces us to the characters of Mitch, Stanley, Pedro and Steve. The poker games is shown as a time for the men to bond, and is the way that they are able to recreate the brotherhood that they had during the war.

An example of Stanley as an alpha male is first given when Stanley decides that they will be playing the poker game at Mitch's, without consulting with him first. When Mitch says this isn't possible, Stanley tries to stay in command by telling Mitch to bring beer.

At the end of the play, we see Steve say that the game is seven-card stud. This is significant because it is the very end of the play, and shows two things. Firstly, it shows that the men are unfazed by the happenings of the night.  The second effect of the line is that it pokes a little bit of fun at Stanley, in that it mentions a stud, which, when juxtaposed with what is happening between Stanley and Stella, shows Stanley's character to a tee.

As soon as Blanche arrives, Stella goes and washes her face, to help herself calm down. Bathing as a major motif is used when something deceptive is going on. Each scene where a lie is being told, or a deception being woven has bathing in it. 

Another thing that bathing does is show Blanche's vulnerabilities, in that when she is bathing, she opens up and sings to herself, which seems to free her from her issues. The same thing happens directly after bathing, where she is a lot less awkward around people afterwards, which shows that bathing is what makes Blanche feel free.

Poetry In Streetcar

Sonnets From The Portugese 43 is a poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and details her undying love for her husband, Robert Browning. Through the sonnet, Browning mentions how she loves him, and lists a dozen different ways. She mentions that she loves him freely, and with undying passion. The love that she feels is un-inhibited by lies, and is honest. There is excessive repitition of the words, "I love thee", which helps to show the undying feelings that she feels towards her husband.

The poem lends itself to A Streetcar Named Desire in a couple of ways. First of all, Blanche. Blance had a fantastic love life, with a young man, who she married and loved to a massive degree. She thought he was sweet, handsome and caring, although slighlty effeminate. Up to this point, you can understand why Blanche thinks of Sonnet 43 as her favourite poem. It describes her love life perfectly. However, it takes a turn of the ironic once you see what she did to her husband. Upon finding out that her husband was a closet homosexual, she completely turned on her heel, and literally destroyed him emotionally. The irony of this is that the poem talks about unconditional love, where Blance does not have that trait.

Mitch, on the other hand, is a perfect mirror of who the poem is written for. He loves his dead girlfriend unconditionally. everything he does is either done for his mother, or his dead girlfriend. He still loves her, and carries a token from her, with a line from the poem engraved in it. This shows that Mitch is a pure character, who doesn't try to show his love, which makes him a genuine character. Blance, being an actress, is dramatic about this love, and uses it to make people like her, which shows the falseness of her character.

Gender Descriptive Words in A Streetcar Named Desire

In A Streetcar Named Desire, there is very gender-specific language used. These words typically describe the characters physical appearances, but also lend themselves to the character's personalities, too.

The two characters that I will discuss here are Blance and Stanley, who the story seems to revolve around.

Blanche is a old-South woman, who sees her self as very upper-class, and very respectable. She looks down on all around her, and thinks that she is better than everybody else. She is an outcast in the setting of New Orleans, and tries to fit into the society with little avail. She also seems to live in an idealized world. Below are 5 words that are used to describe her, and which highlight her character the best.

The first word that I chose describes her best is glamorous. Blance is shown throughout the play as an upper-class woman, who thinks of herself as living the high life. She is constantly changing clothes, as an actress would do, and she portrays herself as a diva would do.

The second word that I chose to describe Blance was liar. Throughout the play, Blanche tells blatant lies to people, to make other people think of her in a better light. This again lends itself to the idea that Blanche is an actress, and shows a public face, which is usually completely different to her real life. One example of these lies, and her manipulation of her sister, is on page 60, where she tells Mitch that she is a year younger than Stella, just to make her seem more important than Stella, and also to save face.

The third word that I would use to describe Blanche is lovely. Blanche has a beauty around her that makes her seem as if she is out-of-place in the rough town of New Orleans. This beauty adds to her character, and helps to show one reason that she lies so often, to protect herself from the harshness of New Orleans.

The fourth word that descibes Blanche best is delicate. Blanche is constantly needing to protect herself from everything, and is always feeling vulnerable in the harsh New Orleans. Her delicateness makes her appear in a way that makes the other characters pity her, something that she seems to thrive off.

The last word that I chose to describe Blanche is dainty. Again, Blanche has a sort of beauty around her that makes her seem fragile, and is what makes Stella and Mitch feel pity for her, and what makes them want to protect her from all the evils of the world. She uses this daintyness to get what she wants from Mitch, and to control everybody else she knows.

Stanley is completly different to Blanche. Not only is he a powerful, strong man, but he is dominating and violent. As a working class man, Stanley feels the need to control everything around him, and when Blanche tries to upset this, he begins to feel threatened.

The first word that I chose to describe Stanley is executioner. Blanche calls him this, while talking to Mitch, and that forshadows both what Stanley is capable of, and also how threatening of a person he is.

Secondly, I would use straightforward to describe Stanley. He doesn't mince his words. If he thinks something, he will say it, which helps to show that he is a powerful man, who doesn't care how his words affect people. This lends itself to the cruel side of Stanley's character, and the impulsiveness. 

Third, Stanley is described as a primtive. This again lends a theme of power in Stanley. When we hear the word primitive, we think of strong, short, hairy powerful neanderthal. This goes along perfectly with the large paragraph that we get at the beginning of the book to describe him.

Pride is another great descriptor for Stanley. Everything that he does is because of his pride. He feels threatened by the presence of Blanche, and feels that he will lose the power that he holds over Stella. He is very controlling, and takes great pride in being the "alpha" of the group.

Finally, I described Stanley as honest. As I said earlier, he doesn't mince his words. When Blanche asks him what he thinks of her, he tells her. He doesn't lie, he doesn't tell a half-truth, he just tells her the truth. And throughout the play we see this. The only time that he doesn't tell the truth is when Blanche is yelling about him.



Stanley: Executioner, straightforward, primitive, pride, honest

Trench Duty

Trench Duty, by Siegfried Sassoon, makes reference to the task the soldiers had to do in this part of the battlefield. This is done to highlight what the poems main theme is, which helps to make the poem stand stronger by itself.

Trench Duty is uses fourteen lines, each with ten syllables. The rhyme pattern is also very simple and clear, following the AABB type for the first eight verses, the ABAB type for the next four and a rhymed couplet for the two last verses as a manner of conclusion. Obviously, this is the formula for a sonnet. The use of a sonnet helps to make the poem feel more personal, as if it is being told from one person to another. 

This is also seen in the use of the first person to tell the poem. We see the use of 'I' through the stanzas, which again helps the poem feel as if it is being told orally from one man in the trenches to another.

In Trench Duty, we see many uses of war diction. Words such as trench, watch, bombardment and raid appear throughout, which solidifies the feeling of war-time in the mind of the reader. We also see diction related to fear and brutality, through words such as 'shaken', 'numbed' and 'horror'. These two styles of diction are used to convey the message of how terrible war is, and how mis-portrayed it is by the government. 


One strong moment in the passage is when Sassoon uses the line, " “Five minutes ago I heard sniper fire: Why did he do it? …Starlight overhead – Blank stars. I’m wide-awake; and some chap’s dead.” I believe that this line, while showing absurdity, is Sassoon's method of coping with what he has seen throughout the war. Not only does he mention the terror that he is feeling in the passage, but he also uses a style of ironic humour to try and pass it off as un-important. This is a well-known coping mechanism in humans, but could also be a use of juxta-position, as the humour shows a stark-contrast to the horrible diction used in the rest of the poem, and therefore highlights it even more.

Blog Portfolio

Coverage:

Commentary Outline on Route March

Why I Chose This Passage From Chapter 3


Interesting Passage In The Sun Also Rises

Minder Mike

Bulls and Steers

Top Ten Reason To Be Bill

Bough of Nonsense Analysis

Repression of War Experience

Analysis of Greater Love


Before The Mirror and Greater Love Comparsion

Dulce Et Decorum Est and Anthem For Doomed Youth Comparsion

Robert Graves and Escape

Trench Duty

Depth:

Bulls and Steers

I chose this article as my depth blog, because I look a little bit more into what made Hemingway tick, and why he used  Bulls and Steers was a major motif in The Sun Also Rises, and also helped me to lean what motivated him in some of the themes of the stories as well, and his personality too!

Interaction:

 Before The Mirror and Greater Love Comparsion

I chose this post because it shows some disagreement between what I think, and what Georgia Nelson thinks about the comparison between Greater Love and Behind The Mirror.

Xeno-Blogging:

Trench Duty

I chose this blog post, from Wesley's blog, because it demonstrates an interesting discussion that we had over the humour of Sassoon.

Discussion:

Robert Graves and Escape

I chose this blog post because it shows a discussion between two of my classmates and myself.

Wild Card:

Gizmodo Girls Hates On Geek Kind

In this wild card, I talk about the relatively recent attack on Jon Finkle, a world-champion Magic: The Gathering player, as a cause for sensationalist journalism.

Gizmodo Girl Hates On Geek Kind

On August 29th, an article released by Gizmodo, a technology blog and opinion site, was written about using OKCupid, a very popular dating website that links people together based on common interests, and how the articles author's experience using the site went. Now, this all sounds fine and dandy so far, why should I care about how somebody's dating experience goes? Frankly, I don't. Usually. However, this article struck a cord. The author of the article,  states that, 'I'm single, I'm busy, and everybody's doing it.' Sure, why not log into a dating website? It might just work out. She then goes on to explain how she was receiving scary posts from people saying lewd things. Again, expected from some of the more shady denizens of the Internet. However, she explains that she got an instant message from a nice sounding guy, and decided to meet up with him. She explains how they had a fairly non-romantic evening, but towards the end of the night, the bomb dropped. She found out that he was the world-champion at Magic: The Gathering. For those of you that don't know, Magic: The Gathering is the worlds first, and most popular, trading card game. Large amounts of people, myself included, purchase cards to play against others in tournaments. She explains how at dinner on the next date, she asked him three questions. These three questions which would determine whether she saw him again she would see him again. There conversation went as follows:

"Did you still play? "Yes." Strike one. How often? "I'm preparing for a tournament this weekend." Strike two. Who did he hang out with? "I've met all my best friends through Magic." Strike three."

Yes. She broke up with him because of these three three response. She refused to understand that he was a nice guy, with a great personality, talent at something, and large amount of money, but she broke up on him because he played a card game. Magic: The Gathering has a large amount of anger towards it because people believe that it is a waste of time, and a waste of money. Some people that I've played with personally have spent up to $20,000 on their decks, which when you think about it, isn't much more than the average person spends on his car hobby, his season tickets to sports games, or other such hobbies.This shameful attack on the poor man even caused famous podcaster and blogger, Veronica Belmont, to tweet:

"I guess attempting to publicly shame a pretty awesome-sounding guy now constitutes tech journalism."

This shows how shallow and mean the writer was. She simply used the article for sensationalist journalism, which is something that Gizmodo are well known for. They have used hard-hitting articles that cause uproars to simply gain hits on their sites. Once again, shameless.

What strikes a cord is that as a geek myself, I've experienced this discrimination personally. I've noticed people judge me because I play World of Warcraft, another massive online game or Dungeons and Dragons, a group role-playing game. And it hurts. Jon Finkel, the world-champion Magic player who was attacked in this article, and everyone of us that is proud of our geek heritage shouldn't have to put up with this.