Female entrapment

Question 1

Elysian fields

Answer 1

• Paradise underworld for immortal heroes
• deceased, virtuous heroes
• Foreshadows Stanley’s victory over Blanche and psychological victory over Stella
• Symbolic of the imbalance between male and female expression
• Blanche: disintegration of her psyche through verbal and physical abuse from Stanley, harsh reality of life and contrasts with her fantasies
• Stella: erodes her self-worth, subservient and trapped by Stanley’s psychological hold

Question 2

Elysian fields

Answer 2

• Ironic
• Main character doesn’t die and doesn’t find peace
• A place like heaven in Greek Mythology. Happy, restful place after death

Question 3

“Can I come watch?”

Answer 3

Stella asks for permission which highlights her stereotypical of women to be submissive

Question 4

“Catches her breath with a startled gesture”

Answer 4

• Highlights her nervousness

Question 5

“Carefully replaces the bottle and washes out the tumbler at the sink”

Answer 5

• deceptive nature
• Alcohol may be her coping mechanisms and her trying to hide it establishes that she is ashamed of her mental distress and reflects her adherence to a strict idea of what a woman should be which has been ingrained in her by her bourgeois upbringing

Question 6

You thought I’d been fired

Answer 6

•. A sense of authority
• Cracks in a personality
• A woman of that high status working as a teacher only means one thing, she needs money

Question 7

“ I cry on his lap like a baby”

Answer 7

Highlights that Stanley and Stella’s relationship is mostly sexual attraction

Question 8

‘Blue piano grows’

Answer 8

• When Blanche is uncomfortable and the world is hostile towards her, a motif

Question 9

“Poems a dead boy wrote. I hurt him the way you would like to hurt me, but you can’t I’m not young and vulnerable anymore. But my young husband was and I-never mind about that! Just give them back to me”- Blanche

Answer 9

This small breakdown from Blanche is one of the first revelations we get of the guilt she feels regarding her husband’s death, as it draws parallels between herself and her husband. She sees them equally as characters too sensitive for the world around them. She is holding on to her sanity, despite what is thrown at her, as a sort of continuation of his life

Question 10

“You look fresh as a daisy” - Stella
“One that’s been picked a few days”- Blanche

Answer 10

Establishes how Blanche feels about aging, it makes her feel anxious and emphasises the link between her wanting to appear beautiful and perfect with her tragic past and time slipping away from her

Question 11

“I can’t stand a naked light bulb, anymore than I can a rude remark or vulgar action”- Blanche

Answer 11

• This line draws a blatant parallel between the motif of Blanche’s discomfort in stark light and her sensitivity to Stanley’s blunt brutishness. It shows us Blanche’s fragility, and the fact that the way she fears being visually exposed to the world is directly linked to her fear of being emotionally exposed

Question 12

At the end of scene 4

Answer 12

• There is a growing distance between the two sisters “listened gravely to Blanche” and shows how Stella is distant from the conversation
• “enters casually with his packages”: Stanley is aware of the situation but acts calmly which goes against Blanches prejudices
• When Stella embraces Stanley, it proves that Stella has chosen Stanley over Blanche

Question 13

When I was sixteen, I made the discovery-love. All at once and much, much too completely. It was like you suddenly turned on a blinding light on something that had always been half in shadow, that’s how it struck the world for me”

Answer 13

Blanche compares her love for Allan as a ‘blinding light’, something that unpleasantly strikes one’s eyes leaving them unable to see for a moment. This metaphor is important because the blinding light held her back from seeing Allan’s sexuality

Question 14

Blanches tragic marriage to Allan makes the audience pity her

Answer 14

• Heartbroken by her loss which evokes pity from the audience
• Her husbands death was the moment she lost her innocence
• Music of the varsouvianna: was playing when she told her husband that he disgusted her
• When the polka resurfaces it signals that Blanche is remembering her greatest regret and is escaping from reality to her fantasy world

Question 15

The significance of the ‘varsouviana’

Answer 15

• A motif
• Represents the extent of her mental deterioration and how strong the effect of the past is for her

Question 16

“crumpled and soiled satin”

Answer 16

• The gown could be read as a symbol of her purity and chastity being soiled or even a reflection of her mental state. The shattered mirror can also be a reflection of her broken spirit and sanity