The Glass Menagerie - Book Report/Review Example

Bohnenkemper Running head: Menagerie THE GLASS MENAGERIE In APA Style Mrs. Bohnenkemper 274N1 Professor Checkett July 25, 2005 Bohnenkemper 2 274N1 Abstract The Glass Menagerie is a semi-autobiographical play that is not only innovative in its style of presentation with Tom as narrator and one of the main characters at the same time but it is also littered with symbolisms. It deals with a family down on its luck, with each of them grappling with pathos-laden conflicts and each of them refusing to face squarely their throttling circumstances through fantasies, escapism and illusions. When their dreams were shattered into pieces, both mother and daughter recoiled to their own shells to lick their own wounds while the son completed his own escapism by leaving. Main Body The Glass Menagerie is the first dramatic play in the tragedy genre of Tennessee Williams that achieved resounding success. It heralded Williams as a high caliber playwright who had the unique talent to create complex, flawed and troubled characters who had to desperately fight tooth and nail to escape their gruesome circumstances. The topic tackled in this paper is the escapism resorted to by the three main characters: Amanda, Laura and Tom and how such escapism affected each separately and the family as a whole. Moreover, this paper ventures the possible ways the characters should have faced reality and if they did so, the possibility that the outcome of their lives could have veered greatly from the tragedy that happened in their lives. Lastly, it answes the question as to who among the three changed the most and who changed the least over the course of the play. This play is about escapism, illusions and fantasies that the three characters used, to deny realities that they cannot cope up with and it illustrates how each character escapes from such reality. This play therefore, travels to the inner souls of the characters as each try to resolve their internal conflicts and find ways to escape from their desperate circumstances that reduce their lives to pathetic, meaningless existence. Laura, who is socially imbalanced and suffers from a low self-esteem and complete lack of self-confidence as well as pathological Bohnenkemper 3 274N1 vulnerability finds that she has nowhere to run to protect herself from a 'cruel world' but must escape in "a world of her own.. a world of glass ornaments" (Part3, scene 5, p.45) because these can never hurt her ultra-sensitive feelings and can never throw her out of her equilibrium. Not only that, she identifies herself with the glass unicorn. As she herself said to Jim "These are little articles of glass, they're ornaments mostly.Mother calls them a glass menagerie!...Oh, be careful, if you breathe, it breaksYou see how the light shines through him" (Scene 7). Laura herself describes that her worth is tantamount to an ornament revealing her low self-esteem and that she is too fragile and delicate and thus she is ill-adapted to survive in a chaotic world.and she perceives herself as devoid of her own light and light must come from outside source to bring out the best in her. Like the glass unicorn, its horn must be broken by her source of hope i.e. Jim for her to return to normalcy. A manda herself, held on to the illusion that she was still the pampered, genteel Southern belle and repeatedly escapes to her glorious past when she was the belle of the ball pursued by 17 gentlemen callers. Part of her escapism consists of her illusion of seeing daughter Laura married to the right gentleman caller and son Tom being a successful businessman. This escapism emanated from her condition of being "a mother deserted" with a "selfish son" who has an "unmarried sister who's crippled and has no job" (Scene 7). This escapism to my opinion is the root cause of the conflicts that overturned this family and produced such venom, disgust and overweening pressures among the characters. That she is an escapist of the first order showed when she greeted Jim with these words, "Well in the South, we had so many servants. Gone! ..All vestiges of gracious living!..I wasn't prepared for what the future brought me. All of my gentlemen callers were sons of planters and so of course I assumed that I would be married to one and raise my family on a large piece of land with plenty of servants. But man Bohnenkemper 4 274N1 proposes and woman accepts the proposal" (Scene 6). These words compose the center of the storm. Because Amanda made the wrong decision of accepting the wrong proposal that brought her to penury and to a life she was not accustomed to, she brought all the disappointments and frustrations to bear on her son and daughter causing all the turmoils and the desperation. As to Tom, he found escape in alcohol, cigarettes, the movies and poetry. Such fervent desire to escape is symbolized by the fire escape and the coffin in the magic show. This longing he tersely expressed i.e "There is a trick that would come in handy for me.get me out of this two by four situation" "But who in hell ever got himself out of one without removing the nail"(Part2, scene 4, p.27) as well as "I know I seem dreaming, but inside.I'm boiling" (Part3, scene 6, p.62). These words prove that he has always wanted to escape the drudgery of his warehouse job and the nagging of his mother but he felt he cannot escape the nailed coffin without destroying the nails i.e. the stability of his family. The above escapism produced profound and disastrous effects to the three as well as to the family. Amanda went down to earth when her plan to find Laura a suitable partner capsized and worst, when Tom called it kaput and left never to return. Laura's last hope of finding a lifetime companion vanished with the announcement of Jim that he is engaged to Betty and like her broken figurines, she is irreparably damaged. Although Tom has left, yet he will forever be hounded that he deserted a sister who is emotionally and financially dependent on him. It affected the family because Tom's leaving broke the unity of the family. Had Amanda accepted the reality that she is now penurious and be content with the fact that at least they are all healthy and together, there should heve been no reason to nag Tom and expect so many things from Laura. The family should have peace of mind and these conflicts Bohnenkemper 5 274N1 shouldn't have occurred. As stressed, they might remain penurious but their lives will be so different without the pressures and the conflicts. Peace of mind cannot be bought. Lastly, I believe that it is Tom who changed the most because he made the most drastic and extreme step i.e. leaving. It is also Laura who changed the least because she only had to revert to her old self after the debacle. This play sheds pathos to all 3 main characters as their tragic lives were traced. Each of them had to struggle against the despair that hung over their lives and this they do by escaping to a life of fantasy and illusions. Amanda dwelt with her glorious past, Tom immersed himself with alcohol, movies and poetry while Laura retreated into the static world of her glass menagerie. It is sad that they cannot face reality and instead chose to seek escape and solace in fantasies and illusions. This play brilliantly illustrates what a dysfunctional family is. Bohnenkemper 6 274N1 REFERENCES Williams, T. (1999). The glass menagerie. New Directions Publishing. The Glas Menagerie, the Movie. Directed by Paul Newman. Starring Joanne Woodward. Read More