Where is streetcar named desire set

The action of the play takes place in the Kowalski home and on the porch and steps of the building. Inside the apartment, there are a living room, kitchen area, bedroom and bathroom. A streetcar is a passenger rail vehicle which runs on tracks along public urban streets and also sometimes on separate tracks.

Browse all BookRags Study Guides. All rights reserved. Williams is presenting here a view of the neighborhood as having a thriving, exuberant atmosphere, one that nurtures an open-minded sense of community. In the low-income world of Stella and Stanley Kowalski, racial segregation appears to be nonexistent, a sharp contrast to the elitist realms of the old South and Blanche Dubois' childhood.

As sympathetic, or pathetic, as Blanche may appear throughout the play, she often says intolerant remarks about class, sexuality, and ethnicity. In fact, in an ironic moment of dignity given his brutality in other contexts , Stanley insists that Blanche refer to him as an American or at least Polish-American rather than use the derogatory term: "Polack.

The beautiful, refined world she longs for never really existed. In the present as well, Blanche maintains this blindness. For all of Blanche's preaching about poetry and art, she cannot see the beauty of the jazz and blues which permeate her present setting. She is trapped in a so-called "refined," yet racist past and Williams, highlighting the contrast to that past, celebrates the uniquely American art form, the music of the blues.

He uses it to provide transitions for many of the play's scenes. This music can be seen to represent the change and hope in the new world, but it goes unnoticed to Blanche's ears. Belle Reve's style of aristocracy has died away and its art and genteel customs are no longer relevant to Kowalski's post-war America. The war brought innumerable changes to American society. Millions of men traveled overseas to face the Axis powers , while millions of women joined the workforce and the war effort at home.

Many women discovered for the first time their independence and tenacity. After the war, most of the men returned to their jobs. Most of the women, often reluctantly, returned to the roles as homemakers. The home itself became the site of a new clash. This post-war tension between the roles of the sexes is another, very subtle thread in the conflict in the play.

Stanley wants to dominate his home in the same way males had dominated American society before the war. Your email address will not be published. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Newsletter Current Newsletter Browse All.

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