David Sotuyo
8/8/2015
Discussion 3 – A Streetcar Named Desire

Stanley Kowalski represents the working class man who on the outside appears to have become a successful, family man by his own judgement. He has bound a woman of much higher class due to his physical strength and sexual prowess. However, we learn later that Stanley has serious issues himself through his actions of beating his wife and raping his wife’s sister. Stanley has reached a point of such accomplishment to himself as though he feels that he can physically do whatever he wants and it won’t have ramifications on his marriage because Stella is so sexually enamored with him. When Stanley throws Stella the packet of meat, everyone understands the sexual reference that he is illustrating. Stella, being so sexually captivated is smitten at the gesture and smiles to show off her pride of catching Stanley’s meat. This also has a deeper value as the meat may represent Stanley only has physical worth to offer and despite the horrific behavior he displays, Stella will always find Stanley’s physical worth to be sufficient despite people’s laughter when he throws the meat, or attempts to separate them exemplified when Blanche tells Stella he raped her. Blanche, like Stanley, shows the dichotomy of what appears to be real and a sense of self-entitlement in juxtaposition with what their character’s behavior actually reveals about what kind of person they are. On the other hand, while Stanley’s self-concept derives from his success in his love life, Blanche was born into a higher social class than Stanley and feels as though that makes her more valuable to society. She feels the same way about her sister Stella and attempt to use that as well to break them up. Despite her looking down on Stanley, Blanche has a secret drinking problem which signifies her past that she continuously tries to escape from. Blanche’s terrible past can be traced back to the suicide of her husband after his homosexuality has been discovered. Blanche’s character is representative of pompous upper class woman who despite her “skeleton’s” casts judgement on people of lower social classes. While Blanche bathes, she sings of a paper moon depicted by a paper lantern, which is