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A review by erinwilham
The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams
3.0
The Glass Menagerie, by Tennessee Williams, was written in order to show the elusiveness of dreams in the face of societal limitation. The protagonist, Tom Wingfield, dreams of escape and adventure, but is bound to his job at the warehouse to provide for his family. Meanwhile, Tom’s mother, Amanda, is determined to fulfill her own undiscovered dreams vicariously through the success of her children.
A major theme of this drama is the attractiveness of dreams and fantasy over reality. All three of the main characters in the play are reluctant to face reality. Laura, for example, withdraws into a world of her own, collecting glass animals that reflect the fragility of her condition, while Tom avoids the reality of home life by watching movies, reading, and drinking. Lastly, Amanda avoids seeing reality as it truly is by convincing herself that she is the high-class Southern belle that she has always dreamt of being, that Laura is a perfectly normal girl who should be receiving as many gentlemen callers as she used to, and that Tom is on the verge of business success. Amanda’s avoidance of reality is less intentional than her children’s, but in this way it is also more severe and distorted.
Williams wrote The Glass Menagerie in the perspective of the protagonist, Tom Wingfield. The narration takes place in the form of Tom’s memories so that he is both the narrator of the play as well as a participant in the action. The way that the story was written was made effective because the dialogue was easier to follow than a novel and the scenes were very easy to visualize because of Williams’ descriptive stage directions.
Although I don’t usually enjoy reading plays as much as novels, I liked The Glass Menagerie overall. Because it was short, it was a fairly easy read and it kept my attention throughout the plot. If I were to rewrite it, the only thing I might change is the length of some of the stage directions, because I felt that sometimes Williams was overly descriptive of the scenery, which I didn’t think was entirely necessary and it became distracting.
A major theme of this drama is the attractiveness of dreams and fantasy over reality. All three of the main characters in the play are reluctant to face reality. Laura, for example, withdraws into a world of her own, collecting glass animals that reflect the fragility of her condition, while Tom avoids the reality of home life by watching movies, reading, and drinking. Lastly, Amanda avoids seeing reality as it truly is by convincing herself that she is the high-class Southern belle that she has always dreamt of being, that Laura is a perfectly normal girl who should be receiving as many gentlemen callers as she used to, and that Tom is on the verge of business success. Amanda’s avoidance of reality is less intentional than her children’s, but in this way it is also more severe and distorted.
Williams wrote The Glass Menagerie in the perspective of the protagonist, Tom Wingfield. The narration takes place in the form of Tom’s memories so that he is both the narrator of the play as well as a participant in the action. The way that the story was written was made effective because the dialogue was easier to follow than a novel and the scenes were very easy to visualize because of Williams’ descriptive stage directions.
Although I don’t usually enjoy reading plays as much as novels, I liked The Glass Menagerie overall. Because it was short, it was a fairly easy read and it kept my attention throughout the plot. If I were to rewrite it, the only thing I might change is the length of some of the stage directions, because I felt that sometimes Williams was overly descriptive of the scenery, which I didn’t think was entirely necessary and it became distracting.