B2- Blanche: Relationships

Question 1

I) Stanleh

Stanley & Blanche: Overview

Answer 1

• Antithesis of everything Blanche outwardly appreciates.
• Savage, uncivilised brute who uses grunts rather than words.

Question 2

II) Stanleh

Stanley & Blanche: Threat

Answer 2

• Stanley is threatened by Blanche
• As she represents a class & society that he does not fully understand
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• Threat becomes larger as he hears STELLA use BLANCHE’S wordswhen they fight. (Links to seed-bearer and “his” woman)
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• Blanche’s influence over what is HIS threatens him (eg his masculinity).
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• The rape can be seen as his (brutal) way of makig her his- it is his only way of overpowering her.

Question 3

III) Stanleh

Blanche & Stanley: Darwin

Answer 3

Stanley can be seen as the Darwinian ‘fittest’ ‘Alpha male’.
- He uses his physicality to assert dominance over Blanche.

Question 4

IV) Stanleh

“That man is my…”

Answer 4

Blanche tells MITCH:
“That man is my executioner! That man will destroy me, unless”
Foreshadows the play’s tragic climaxe

Question 5

V) Stanleh

Nietzschean interpretation of Blanche and Stanley

Answer 5

Would look at how:
- The Apollonian Blanche (Imagination, reason, purity, and disorder) and Dionysian Stanley (pleasure and chaos)
- Disintegrate when they operate as extremes.
Blanche who thrives on propriety gets lost in that illusion while Stanley is driven solely on instincts and is destructive as a result of this.
However, Stanley is eventually victorious!

Question 6

I) Stellarrr

Stella & Blanche: Overview

Answer 6

Blanche’s younger sis
- Easily influenced and manipulated by BDB.
- Cares deeply for Blanche & tries to protect her.
//
- V. Submissive and cannot stand against STANLEY
- (She is dependent on Stanley & pregnant with his child)
- Stella’s inability to stand up to her husband partly seals Blanche’s fate.

Question 7

I) Allan

Allan & Blanche: Overview

Answer 7

Blanche’s young husband who killed himself :(
- Allan’s presence, represented as Blanche’s guilt, haunts the play as the Varsouviana plays whenever she is stressed.
- It is his death that changed Blanche into the unpure person that’s juxtaposed against STELLA’s memories of her as innocent.

Question 8

I) Mitch:

Mitch & Blanche: Overview

Answer 8

Sensitive and well-mannered.
- Develops as a chance for Blanche to redeem herself from her past & start fresh.
- Falls for Blanche’s act, comforts her over ALLAN.
- He is at his highest point when he reacts with sympathy for Blanche’s trauma- however, STANLEY shatters the illusion.
Mitch fails to understand Blanche following this and blames Stanley for meddling in his relationship.