An Analysis Of Laura Wingfield In The Glass Menagerie

Williams’s play is a tragedy, and one of quietude. He once expressed that “Glass Menagerie is my first quiet play, and perhaps my last.” It is a play of profound sadness, and through relationships between characters, portrays the “cries of the heart.” There is no cry more powerful that the cry and inner desperation of the heart. Williams’s has very little social context, but rather focuses on the conflicts within a domestic family. Such a focus is powerful, and the playwright expresses this power and importance implicitly through the estranged relationship between Amanda and Tom Wingfield.

Though most children in the United States are raised in a safe and secure environment, there are many who are not. In 2013, 3.9 million children were the focuses of at least one Child Protective Services report in the United States; close to one-fifth of these reports (679,000) were confirmed (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2015). In his novel, The Lost Boy, author, Dave Pelzer, describes the life of a young boy during his abusive times at home, court room hearings, and movement from foster home to foster home. He depicts the story from the child, David’s perspective. This allows for the reader to understand how a child views the welfare system, foster system, child therapy, and more. The main problem David experienced, besides the abuse from his biological mother, was an overall lack of support. “Facts for Families” (2000) claims that children have basic needs for both physical and mental health, including unconditional familial love, a safe and secure environment, and appropriate (emphasis on the appropriate) support and discipline. After being separated from his family, David jumped from foster home to foster home. Many times, this was simply due to a misunderstanding or circumstances that were in no way his fault, though he blamed himself a lot. This book illustrates the trials of one young boy, yet it speaks for the millions of children in the U.S. who go through these same hardships in their everyday lives.

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fears that she has lost or is losing him as far as the big things, the

The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams is a celebrated and cherished play that has affected generations. Written in 1945, the play very well may have been an outlet for Williams to accept what had happened to his own sister. Rose Williams had been lobotomized due to schizophrenia, affecting her brother greatly. While Williams’ family may be real, his characters are over dramatic and eccentric. The characters of Amanda, Tom, and Laura make up an extremely dysfunctional family living together in a 1930’s Saint Louis. By the end of the play, each character has affected themselves and each other. The characters spend the majority of their lives inventing someone who will make the rest of their family members happy, and when these facades crumble,

   Tennessee Williams' play, The Glass Menagerie, describes three separate characters, their dreams, and the harsh realities they face in a modern world.  The Glass Menagerie exposes the lost dreams of a southern family and their desperate struggle to escape reality. Williams' use of symbols adds depth to the play. The glass menagerie itself is a symbol Williams uses to represent the broken lives of Amanda, Laura and Tom Wingfield and their inability to live in the present.

“This presidential power is controversial because it is nowhere mentioned in the U.S. Constitution”(Rozell). The President, since the beginning, has gained powers not specifically enumerated, increasing the power of the executive branch. Over the course of history the President has assumed many powers unlisted in the Constitution including the line item veto, executive privilege, and executive order which have all impacted the President’s relationship with Congress.

In The Glass Menagerie, Tennessee Williams beautifully encapsulates man’s desire to escape from uncomfortable emotional and physical situations. Whether he’s showing a young man trapped in a factory job he hates, an aging single mother who mourns for her life as Southern belle, or a young lady who fears that she’ll spend her life alone, he clearly demonstrates these desires and fears for his audience. Williams shows us through the actions of his characters how humans handle a wide variety of uncomfortable situations, and how these situations dramatically influence one’s ability to thrive. The playwright doesn’t seem to believe in the idea of “bloom where you’re planted”, and the desire to escape becomes a major theme of the play, demonstrated across multiple characters in a wide variety of ways. Creative individuals often do not thrive in noncreative, industrial environments. Williams demonstrates this clearly in this “memory play”, which carries many autobiographical element. Tom Wingfield represents his own character, Williams himself, and also serves as a narrator, making him quite the complex character. Williams’s uses Tom to show how an emotionally complex, creative individual can quickly feel trapped and tied down in a factory job, longing to get out, see the world, and pursue a job with more creative elements. Tom’s escapism, drinking, and evening theatrical adventures all reflect the life of the playwright himself, as Williams was known to struggle with alcoholism

For example, when Amanda was going through the finances, she asked Laura what her plans were for the future, while she joked about how they might had an opportunity in business if it wasn’t for Laura’s nervousness (Scene 1, 980). When Laura mentioned to her mother that she was ‘crippled’, Amanda stopped her and told Laura to never speak negatively

She struggles with being a recluse in her own home, crippled by her own leg, yet she shows compassion to her counterparts when they exude greed. She is not the main protagonist, but the whole plot revolves around her and her symbols. Every character portrays their own version of Laura onto her in an attempt to project their unfulfilled desires into Laura. The most obvious case is from Amanda, who continuously uses her own youth as a way to try and mold Laura into her former self. Jim on the other hand sees Laura as a unicorn, an exotic creature that does not exist in this world. Just like how unicorns are different from other horses, Laura is different from other girls. The unicorn being glass only furthers how easily Laura takes in the light of other people (their projections on her), and she reflects them out to please the projector. But these projections are fruitless because Laura in fact has a mind of her own, and she acts upon her own will, as shown by her skipping class. When the unicorn breaks, Laura is brought into a pit of despair, fueled by the glass

The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams narrates the story of a dysfunctional Southern family during the Great Depression struggling to achieve their dreams. The novel is written as a memory from Tom Wingfield’s mind as he looks back on his past. Amanda Wingfield, the mother, unable to come to term with the reversal of economic and social fortunes, controls her children’s lives. Laura Wingfield, her daughter, is terribly shy and just wants to stay home, while Tom, Laura’s brother, hates his job. Amanda wants Laura to become get married soon, while Tom wants to escape his boring life and experience adventure. The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams should be added to next year's curriculum because of its insight on distorted reality and

Contributing to these feelings was the reassurance she received from Jim, who told her that she was beautiful, but not in a way that most girls were. That there was something unique about her that he couldn’t quite put his finger on. This is the moment that Laura truly comes to appreciate herself and hold herself to a higher standard because if she chooses not to let her disability get the best of her, other people will be more likely to embrace her for her, and not her disability. She realized that the words “different” and “unique” can exist in the same realm, that “different” doesn’t necessarily have to have a negative connotation. Even with her mother’s constant interference into her personal life, trying to form her into something she never wishes to be, Laura is still able to embrace her features entirely and build up some confidence in herself through the connections she formed with her

When she tries to take the speed test at Rubicum's Business College, Laura is traumatized and leaves the school to walk about at the zoo during class time showing us how incapable she at fitting in (In The Glass Menagerie, eNotes.com). The most obvious and simple symbol of Laura’s refusal to engage in society is the Victrola, an old-fashioned record player. Laura retreats to the Victrola many times in the play, most significantly twice. The first time the Victrola most clearly demonstrates Laura’s diffidence comes shortly after she ditches school. Amanda tells Tom that Laura cannot spend all of her time playing and listening to the Victrola, indicating how memories can tie someone up and, in this case, cripple and deprive theme of a future.

Tom Wingfield is the narrator and dominant character in Tennessee Williams’ timeless play, The Glass Menagerie. Through the eyes of Tom, the viewer gets a glimpse into the life of his family as well as into the depressed era that they live in. His mother is a southern belle who desperately tries to hold onto her past and her position within a society bygone; his sister who is tentative and cripplingly shy lacks the social skillset to function openly in society; Tom himself is a young writer and poet who is continually distraught over his life, which to him lacks adventure and substance. Williams has managed to write a magnificent play which incorporates

The Glass Menagerie is a play, told by the memories of the narrator, Tom Wingfield. Tom loves books and writing but is working in a warehouse to support his mother, Amanda, and sister, Laura. Mr. Wingfield, Tom and Laura’s father, ran off years ago leaving Tom to be the man of the house. Tom's decision to leave his mother and sister was justified on the grounds that Amanda tends to show him little to no respect, on top of the lack of respect Tom feels as if he would be better off doing what he would like to do. Adventure. With those being said, of course it’s difficult for Tom to make this decision because he is unsure of the state it would leave his mother and sister in, with nobody to take care of them is unsure whether it’s the right decision.