The English Department Website

 General Questions

 1.     Discuss Williams’ characterisation of either Mitch, Stella, Blanche or Stanley. Refer to the character's speech, interactions with others, movements and clothing. 

4.        To what extent can Blanche DuBois be described as a victim in A Streetcar Named Desire?

5.        How effective a title do you think A Streetcar Named Desire is for this play?

6.        Discuss the importance of the past in A Streetcar Named Desire.

8.        Blanche believes that the opposite of death is desire.  How is this theme developed throughout the play?

9.        Williams viewed the characters he created as ‘my little company of the faded and frightened, the difficult, the odd, the lonely.’  Are any of the characters from A Streetcar Named Desire recognisable from this description?

10.    Discuss the role of music and other sound effects in A Streetcar Named Desire.

11.    ‘His plays deal consistently with a serious theme – self-pity, the persistence of memory that holds people in its grip and will not let them get on with their lives.’  Do you think that this statement can be applied to A Streetcar Named Desire? 

12.    How are the past and present intertwined in A Streetcar Named Desire?

 13.    Discuss the view that A Streetcar Named Desire is a play concerned with the conflict between the values of the old world and the new, and that this conflict is expressed through the battle between Stanley and Blanche.

 14.    Do you agree that the relationship of Blanche and Stanley, as it develops through the play, is simply one of villain and victim?

 15.    ‘The play is less a lament to the world to which Blanche was born than it is a lament for the dream of it.’  To what extent do you agree with this view?

 16.    How important are illusion and fantasy as themes in A Streetcar Named Desire?