At the end of scene ten, something dramatic happens between Blanche and Stanley while Stella is gone at the hospital. It is not directly stated in the play what happens, but it is pretty clear from the cues that Stanley forces himself onto Blanche. Some of the clues to this in scene ten are when Stanley says "Come to think of it-maybe you wouldn't be bad to-interfere with...," and "We've had this date with each other from the beginning!" Also, the stage cues say that Stanley advances on Blanche, knocks her out, and takes her to the bed. Obviously, this traumatic experience has a great effect on Blanche, which can be seen in scene eleven. Blanche has gone mad to a degree as a result of her encounter with Stanley. Blanche seems aloof, and out of it in scene eleven. In scene eleven, Blanche has an outburst, saying "What's going on her?" After hearing Mitch's voice, Blanche goes silent for awhile, and then hysterically forgets whats happening. Because of Blanche's sudden loss of sanity, Stella makes a decision to send Blanche to a mental hospital. Blanche is seriously affected by her experience with Stanley, and Stella decides that the best thing for Blanche is to be taken care of. Blanche is no longer able to take care of herself, and she has some serious emotional scars from being raped. This terrible event is scene ten does not just affect Blanche though, it affect the relationship between Stanley and Stella. Because Stella has some ideas about what happened to Blanche to affect her so drastically, she is very angry at Stanley. This can be seen at the very end of the play when Stella is crying, and Stanley is trying to console her, but she is unresponsive to his love. There is a rift created in the marriage between Stella and Stanley at the end of the play, and the reader can't know whether their marriage will hold or if they will break up.
During a talk with Mitch, Blanche says "I don't want realism. I want magic. I try to give that to people. I misrepresent things to them. I don't tell truth, I tell what ought to be the truth." When she says this, Blanche means that she likes to forget the past, and live a fantasy. She doesn't want to tell people about her past, and she says that she is willing to lie and "misrepresent" things in order to maintain her fantasy.
Blanche's many "intimacies with strangers" were sexual encounters that Blanche had while she was at the hotel Flamingo. The reason that Blanche had these encounters may be due to her need for money after the loss of Belle Reve. Another reason for Blanche's behavior may have been for her need for love and her despair after she lost Belle Reve. In scene nine, the appearance of the Mexican women selling flowers is very symbolic of the impending "death" for Blanche. This "death" may not be actual death, but Blanche does experience a death of her sanity, and a death of her freedom later in the play. Also, Blanche is the only one who sees the Mexican women, so this woman may be real, but she may also be a apparition of Blanche's mind, signaling Blanche's future doom. From scene 7 till the end of the play, the dynamics in the play change drastically. In scene 7, the everyday life of the characters continues, and nothing seems to be drastically wrong on the surface. This transitions to the state at the end of the play where Blanche is being taken away to an insane asylum and Stanley and Stella's marriage is threateningly weak. What causes this drastic change in the events of the play is that Stanley enacts his attack on Blanche. Before these scenes, there is tension between Blanche and Stanley, but there was nothing to push the conflict to another level. Then, Stanley finds evidence about Blanches past, and he is able to attack her with this information. This throws the household into a state of turmoil as Stanley tries to get rid of Blanche, which causes harm to both Blanche and Stella. Stanley also tells Mitch about what he found out about Blanche, which causes the relationship between Mitch and Blanche to decline. In these scenes, on a general level, Blanche declines until she is reduced to a lost, delirious girl.
In scene six, Blanche talks about her views on love using light imagery and diction, but the lighting in this scene is dark and at night. This causes a disparity between what Blanche is saying and the connotation the surroundings are giving off. The viewer may then question what Blanche is saying, and begin to analyze whether what she is saying is true or not. While Blanche talks using light imagery, she prefers the dark because she likes to hide in the dark. Blanche is much about deception and hiding, so she prefers the dark which doesn't show much about her like her age. In the beginning of the play, Blanche covers up the light in her room with the paper lantern, showing once again her aversion to light.
In scene five, Blanche and Stanley have yet another conflict as the tension between the two of them escalates. In this scene, Stanley and Blanche discuss their astrological signs, and Stanley asks Blanche whether she knows someone named Shaw. It seems like just heated discussion between the two, but there is so much more going on. There is a ton of underlying venom and tension in the dialogue between Stanley and Blanche. They both throw biting bits at each other during the discussion about astrological signs. This is a point in the novel where the power struggle between Blanche and Stanley is at its maximum. Right before Stanley exits the scene, he hits Blanche with a dagger. He hints to her that he knows about her scandalous experiences at the hotel Flamingo. This shifts the power struggle at the end of this scene greatly in favor of Stanley, because he has something to hold over Blanche.
In scenes three and four of A Streetcar Named Desire, I learned a lot more about the relationship between Blanche and Stella. They have a weird relationship for a couple of sisters. They seem like they do care for each other, and they are concerned for each other, but there is also a weird side to their relationship. It seems to me like something happened between Stella and Blanche in their past back at Belle Reve that has left both with sour feelings toward the other. Another interesting relationship that has developed in these scenes is the relationship between Stella and Stanley. As seen in the first scenes, they must love each other very much, but Stanley is a little rude and blunt toward Stella. In these scenes, Stanley hits Stella, but ends up very affectionate and sleeps with her that night. This adds another perspective to their relationship, as Stanley is bit abusive toward Stella. It seems like he gets like that when he drinks, which lets us know that Stanley might have a drinking problem. It is quite odd how their relationship works, and how Stella chooses Stanley over Blanche right after Stanley hit her. I look forward to seeing how the play unfolds in the future scenes.
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