Thalia D’Angelo
Professor Brady
English 102
March 11th, 2014
Is
this even real?
Throughout history
people have developed different ways to cope with the world around them. I’ve
been told from a young age to “face my fears” but that is much easier said than
done. In A Streetcar Named Desire by
Tennessee Williams, Blanche turns to drinking and also creates herself a world
where nothing bad has happened and where she is young and beautiful. She is
overly obsessed with innocence, youth and elegance that she creates a façade
and lies to the people around her. She eventually comes crashing down from this
fantasy world when her sister’s husband, Stanley, finds out the truth of her
past and reveals it. Creating a fantasy world is dangerous for Blanche because
eventually she finds herself unable to live in the real world. Stanley rips the
last bit of sanity from her and Blanche completely submerged in her fantasy. Since
Blanche couldn’t cope with her reality she falls too far into her fantasy,
unable to ever escape. Other characters have also been through the same fate
Blanche has, but sadly she was in too deep. Being unable to cope is why some
people take up drinking, some do drugs, and a brave few face their fears and
challenges up front.
Blanche DuBois is
a lost, confused and tragic character. She is not used to the relaxed and fun lifestyle
in New Orleans like her sister, Stella. She’s grown up as a Southern belle but
now in New Orleans she sees her opportunity to make a new, brighter future for
herself because she is in denial of her past. She tells Stella, “So Mr.
Graves--Mr. Graves is the high school superintendent--he suggested I take a
leave of absence” (Blanche, 11). The reader later finds out Blanche lied and actually
got fired from teaching because she had an affair with a 17 year old student.
Now that Blanche is in a new city she wants to maintain an image. Blanche also
lies to Mitch about her age. In her mind she was supposed to be married and
with children at this point in her life, which was normal for the time period. Blanche
tells Mitch, “Never inside, I didn't lie in my heart” (Blanche, 89). This line
shows that Blanche is believing her own lies to Mitch, for example that she’s younger
than Stella and that she’s been a good, innocent person. Another factor that
contributed to Blanche creating an illusion is her closeness to death. She had caught
her husband Allan with another man, which was wrong back then, and while
dancing together she drove him to shoot himself. Now she hears polka music
whenever she’s alone which drives her to face the reality of that night, but
she usually tries to bathe or drink the music away. Blanche is then surrounded
by death when all her relatives at Belle Reve pass away. Being around that much
death has an effect on people! I believe that since she was obsessed with a
perfect life and never seeming to be around anything positive Blanche had to
create herself this world, but the problem is she never learned how to face
reality thus driving her crazy.
Blanche’s fantasy world
isn’t her only coping mechanism. Coping mechanisms vary greatly
depending on the person. Denial
is the refusal to accept reality or fact, acting as if a painful event, thought
or feeling did not exist. It is also one of the most primitive coping mechanisms
there is (Grohol). Blanche is in denial of
her failed past and refuses to accept it. After the death of her husband
blanche began to have sexual relations with other people in her town, Laurel. Blanche
also exhibits the negative coping mechanism called faultfinding. Instead of
being happy that Stella is married with a home, she calls the home a dump
basically and calls Stanley a monster. One positive thing Blanche does is
bathes. Although she does it to rid herself of the dirt form her past, she also
feels a sense of calmness while bathing. This is a relaxation coping mechanism
for her, which is good ("How
Do You Cope?"). However, she drowns in her lies by the end of the play. If she
learned to face her situations in life, Blanche ultimately would not have lost
her sanity.
Other characters in
literature also respond to stress by creating an illusion of a place or person,
such as Holden Caulfield in The Catcher
in The Rye by J.D Salinger. The novel portrays a teenage rebel trying to
tell his story. The book is told from Holden’s point of view and is very
informal. Holden starts his story with a bit of background, telling the reader
he gets kicked out of private school, and not the first time either, and then
leaves to go to Manhattan earlier than his school wanted. Holden despises the
fact his family has money and send his away to private schools. He’s never
without money in his wallet and in the 1950’s that was very rare for a kid and
fortunate. He reveals he is in a metal institution for, what is assumed to be, posttraumatic
stress disorder. He had to deal with the death of his little brother who he was
very close with and that death was the start of Holden losing his sanity. He’s
also smitten with a girl named Jane Gallagher, even though he hasn’t spoken to
her in years. He creates an illusion in his head that she is the perfect girl
and someone very innocent. He even calls her home several times throughout the
book as well. This relates to Blanche because she also developed an infatuation
with someone she barely knew. She falls for a married man, Shep Huntleigh, and
is sure he’s going to support her financially and save her from herself. This is untrue however and is just another
lie that Blanche tells the world to keep up with her façade. She convinces
herself he is going to come back because Blanche just wants someone to love
her. Both of these characters have created a person they can care about and
fight for, even though that person may not be theirs in the first place. This
way they both have something to fixate on until they both get worn down. Holden
finally must face the fact his brother isn’t coming back and that he must grow
up and Blanche must face the fact she had a bad past and can not keep lying to
everyone including herself.
Blanche DuBois and
Holden Caulfield are just two examples of people unable to cope with their
world. Blanche creates herself an illusion, a fantasy world, where she is happy
and fine; Holden develops an infatuation for a girl he barely knows anymore and
rebels against his privileged life. The way these two face their realities are
negative coping mechanisms and causes them both to end up in mental
institutions, Blanche’s condition worse than Holden’s. A Streetcar Named Desire shows that it is important to face the
challenges in one’s life rather than hid behind a façade or illusion. In all if
a person doesn’t they can eventually lose their sanity, like these characters,
and end up worse off than before.
Works Cited
Grohol,
John M., Dr. "15 Common Defense Mechanisms | Psych Central." Psych
Central.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Mar. 2014.
<http://psychcentral.com/lib/15-
common-defense-mechanisms/0001251?all=1>.
"How
Do You Cope?" Coping Styles, Coping Mechanisms: Ways To Deal With
Stress
Dual
Diagnosis Program.
N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Mar. 2014.
<http://www.semel.ucla.edu/dual-diagnosis-program/News_and_Resources/How_Do_You_Cope>.
Salinger,
J. D. The Catcher in the Rye. Boston: Little, Brown, 1951. Print.
Williams,
Tennessee. A Streetcar Named Desire: A Play. New York: New Directions,
1947. Print.
