Sunday, March 15, 2009

And the Victim is...

Blanche and Stanley are victims of each other. Stanley is victimized by Blanche's superiority complex. She just showed up on his doorstep one day and ruined the status quo of Stella and his life. Blanche was full of lies and never told Stanley the truth. He was the last person she wanted to confide in. Blanche came in and took over his house by redecorating and drinking all of his alcohol. She provided no fiscal help to the household so she ended up being another person that Stanley had to support, against his will for a long period of time. He thought that he lost his share of money from Belle Reve due to Blanche's extravagant spending habits and felt left out of some fortune because Blanche had mismanaged everything making him a victim of Blanche's inability to manage money. Once she came in she made no effort to leave quickly and was not at all nice to her host. From day one, she berated Stanley and dismissed him as someone of an inferior class, a "Polack". Blanche created a lot of unnecessary drama in Stanley's house and she was unwilling to face her own reality, even though she saw herself as inferior to Stanley she was in no way better than him.

Even though Blanche saw herself as a superior being, she was a victim to her own lack of self control, which ended up being Stanley's primary tool against her. She lost everything. She lost the house that she grew up in that had been in her family for generations. Blanche lost her husband and her job. She ended up being kicked out of the town that her entire life had been based in. Blanche's lack of understanding made her feel like a victim when her marriage was slightly off and her husband killed himself. She did not know how to help him or herself and she let her life fall apart around her. There was no one to support her lavish habits and she lost Belle Reve for financial reasons. Blanche then went on to make other people her victims to maintain her sense of superiority, but while doing that she made herself seem more awful, thus victimizing herself further. By sleeping with her seventeen year old student, she used him and would normally be thought of as a suspect, but it caused her to lose her job, so she once again became the victim. Blanche prostituted herself at the Flamingo where she could hide from the socialites who knew her, but that only lasted so long as her reputation ended up getting her kicked out of town. She showed up on her sister's doorstep and Stanley did not welcome her at all. She was a bit of an instigator as she called him inferior names, but he ended up living up to those names throughout the story. Stanley verbally tortured her to get the truth out of her because he never believed her and then when he found out the truth from someone he worked with he thought that to be valid over what she said. Blanche was having a fine time with Mitch when Stanley ruined their relationship. Blanche's victimization can most easily be seen at the end of the story when she was raped by Stanley and then taken to a mental institution. He used and abused her, regardless of how much stress she might have caused him as an awful houseguest, that left him no right to live up to his brute reputation and rape her. Shortly after that, a doctor and nurse came in to take her to a mental institution. She was clearly unstable and was being dragged off to a foreign place by strangers. Blanche victimized herself and Stanley made her even more of a victim while suffering through Blanche's presence and the insecurities she inflicted on him.

1 comment:

  1. I disagree that Stanley is a victim. He raped Blanche and won the battle against her as she get taken to the mental asylum in the end of the play. Also Stella sides with him and does not believe that he raped Blanche.

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