By Tennessee Williams (March 26, 1911 – February 25, 1983)
Themes of the play
- Abandonment
- The difficulty of accepting reality
- The impossibility of true escape
- The unrelenting power of memory or Illusion or Disillusionment
Characters
Tom Wingfield
His features:
- Narrator of the drama
- An aspiring poet
- A labor in profession
- Responsible young man
- An escapist
- Obsessed with disillusionment or illusion
- Having a nickname ‘Shakespeare’
Tom is an aspiring poet who works in the Continental Shoemakers warehouse. He is the narrator of the play and the action of the play is framed by Tom’s memory. Tom loves his mother and sister, but he feels trapped at home. They are dependent on his wages and as long as he stays with them he feels he can never have a life of his own. Nightly, he disappears to “go to the movies.” As the play continues, Tom feels increasingly imprisoned and his mother begins to sense his stirrings. She makes him a deal – as long as he finds a husband for Laura, he’s free to escape. But Tom is trapped by his own guilt for leaving and his own repressed rage for being put in a position where his freedom comes at the expense of his own conscience.
Amanda Wingfield
Her features:
- A middle age abandoned wife and single mother
- Southern belle in her youth
- Obsessed with her past
- Concern for her daughter Laura’s future
- Interfering woman
Once a Southern belle who was the darling of her small town’s social scene, Amanda is now an abandoned wife and single mother living in a small apartment in St. Louis. She dreams of her past and of her daughter’s future but seems unwilling to recognize the painful harsh realities of the present. She is a loving mother, but her demands make life difficult for Laura and unbearable for Tom. Amanda finally senses Tom’s stirrings to leave and makes a deal with him – that if he can find a suitable replacement for himself in the form of a husband for Laura, then he can disappear for good. In all reality, then, Amanda is holding her son hostage – threatening his future in order to ensure her own.
Laura Wingfield
Her features:
- Crippled from childhood
- Painfully shy and frightened
- Obsessed with glass menagerie
- Passionate but unable to express feelings
- A college drop out
- Having a nick name ‘Blue Roses’
Crippled from childhood, Laura walks with the aid of a leg brace. Laura is painfully shy, unable to face the world outside of the tiny Wingfield apartment. She spends her time polishing her collection of tiny glass animals, her “glass menagerie.” Her presence is almost ghostly, and her inability to connect with others outside of her family makes her dependent on Tom and Amanda. Jim’s nickname for her, “Blue Roses,” suggests both her odd beauty and her isolation, as blue roses exist nowhere in the real world. She is in many ways like Rose, Tennessee Williams’ real-life sister. As a parallel to Rose, then, Laura becomes helpless and impossibly passive – rendered to a fate entirely dictated by Tom’s own decisions. Laura’s passivity, meanwhile, incurs a tremendous amount of guilt and repressed rage in Tom, who has trouble leaving as long as he thinks of his sister.
Jim O’Connor
His features:
- Outgoing or extrovert and very friendly
- An enthusiastic young man
- Belief in self-improvement
- Symbol of expectation but ironic
Jim is the long-awaited gentleman caller for Laura – and the supposed prospect for her matrimony. He is outgoing, enthusiastic, and believes in self-improvement. He kisses Laura and raises her hopes that they might be together, before he finally reveals to her that he is engaged. Tom describes him as a person more connected to the real world than any of the other characters, but Jim is also a symbol for the “expected something that we live for.”
Critical summary
Summary
We will remember this whole play by dividing it into seven parts.
1. The beginning of the event
2. His mother’s thoughts on Laura
3. Tom’s job and friendship with Jim
4. Invite Jim home
5. Discussion of Tom, Amanda, and Jim
6. Laura and Jim’s private time
7. The end
Let’s discuss the seven sections.
- The beginning of the event
The Glass Menagerie is essentially a memoir set in the past. Here the event is presented by the protagonist. The event took place around 1937 and the location was set to St. Louis. Tom works in a shoe factory. He lives with his mother and sister. Her father left them and moved to another place and has not been seen since. No letter is even exchanged. We can say that their family is a broken family. Laura collected glass-made-animals. One day Tom broke some of the animal collections in an argument with his mother. He had a collection of favorite animals known as unicorns. A unicorn can be called a horse with two horns. Tom and Laura’s mother, Amanda, spends time with her family telling a variety of stories. She was a girl from a decent family but sadly her husband left her and moved away. She regales her children with stories about various aspects of her y2. His mother’s thoughts on Laura
- Her mother’s thoughts on Laura
Laura is a disabled girl because one of her two legs is relatively short. For this, her mother is very disappointed and worried about her future. She feels very ashamed because of this handicap. She couldn’t match herself at all and could not attract any good boy to her. Laura’s mother’s worries are endless about this. At one point, Laura’s mother thought that life would not go on like this. At least Laura has to do something so that she can be independent. Besides, her family’s income will come from this. According to her thinking, Amanda gets Laura into business college. But after a week, Laura’s mother found that Laura was not attending classes properly. She wanders by herself instead of going to class. Seeing this, Laura’s mother saw that Laura would not be given up like this. She would have to make a final arrangement. Then, Amanda starts selling the magazine, and she believes that a man will be found for Laura as a husband.
3. Tom’s job and friendship with Jim
As mentioned earlier, Tom works in a shoe factory. There he met his colleague Jim and by chance, they became good friends. Tom was mainly fond of literature, wine, and party. He wants to escape from his shoe factory, where he works at any cost. He did not like working in a shoe factory. In the end, he says his job is no longer there, and for this, his mother scolds him. Tom’s mother tells him to find a man for Laura and to keep his eyes and ears open. At one point, Tom chooses Jim as Laura’s suitor.
4. Invite Jim home
One day Tom invited Jim to his house for dinner. Here Tom’s mother and Tom’s intention is to create attraction by meeting Laura and Jim. Amanda did her best not to let this plan go to waste. She instructs Laura to present herself in front of Jim in a beautiful dress. Likewise, Laura must open Jim’s door when Jim enters the house. This might make it possible for Jim to become attracted to Laura. Laura opens the door but quickly leaves due to her shyness. Even when the meal was going on, Laura pretended to be sick and didn’t show herself.
5. Discussion of Tom, Amanda, and Jim
Tom and Jim sat and talked. Tom says that the income he earns from working in a shoe factory goes towards his family’s electricity bills. He is talking about the poverty of his family. Meanwhile, Amanda meets Jim and talks like she’s known him for a long time. Tom’s mother came in front of Jm in her old gorgeous dress. At the end of their dinner, the electricity suddenly went off because their electricity bills had not been paid in full. Then, Tom’s mother and Tom wanted a candlelit conversation between Laura and Jim.
6. Laura and Jim’s private time
Laura and Jim continue to talk. Here Laura pretends to be paralyzed patient because she is very shy. But Jim’s open and friendly behavior helps her enjoy the time. She tells Jim that she had an attraction to Jim during high school. She reminds him that he named Laura “Blue Roses.” Jim is surprised to hear this and scolds her for her shyness. Immediately he praised her uniqueness. Laura shows him a collection of her favorite animals, and they dance at one point. Suddenly, while dancing, Jim’s hand hits her unicorn, and the horn breaks. The unicorn turns into a normal horse. Suddenly, Jim gets up and says that he has to go now because his girlfriend is waiting. Laura asks him to take the unicorn as a gift. As Jim was leaving the room, Tom’s mother entered. Jim tells Amanda that he needs to go now because his girlfriend or fiance is waiting. He leaves with a warm farewell from Amanda.
7. The end
Tom’s mother blames Tom whenever Jim goes out. Tom says he doesn’t have a job anymore and leaves the house. A year later, he remembered that memory. And basically, this whole incident comes from this memory.
The Moral
It is our prime responsibility to forget disillusionment and only focus on the present.
