Alienation of the Wingfields in The Glass Menagerie

by赵赵赵

A thesis presented to the School of EnglishStudies of

Xi’an International Studies Universityin partial fulfillment of the requirements

for the degree ofBachelor of Arts

May.18, 2012

Class: 2008-9

Advisor: 赵赵赵

安安安安安安西安 安 安 安 安 安 安 安

赵赵 赵赵赵 赵赵 女 赵赵 2008-

09

赵赵 08010109

24

赵赵赵赵：

赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵 赵赵赵赵《》一

Alienation of the Wingfields in The Glass Menagerie

赵赵赵赵赵赵: 2011 赵 8 赵 29 赵 赵 2012 赵 5 赵 18 赵

赵赵赵赵赵赵：

赵赵西 ·赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵一， 。一《》

赵赵赵赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵。，一，，。

赵赵赵赵：

Corrign, Mary Ann. Memory, Dream, and Myth in the Plays of

Tennessee Williams.

London: Renascence Spring, 1975.

Donahue, Francis. The Dramatic World of Tennessee Williams. New

York: Frederick Ungar, 1964.

Roudane, Matthew, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Tennessee

Williams. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education

Press, 2000.

赵赵赵. 《20 赵赵赵赵赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵： 》 . 赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵：，2004.

赵赵赵赵 (赵赵)

赵 赵 赵

《安安安安安安安安安安 安安安安一》

安安：

赵赵西·赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵 赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵一。一，。 一《》

安安安：

赵赵赵赵 赵赵 赵赵赵赵 赵赵赵 赵赵一；；；

Alienation of the Wingfields in The Glass

Menagerie

Abstract:

Tennessee Williams is one of the most important

playwrights of America in twentieth century. In his life

span, he has created more than 60 plays, among which is

the most successful play, The Glass Menagerie. In the play,

Williams depicts an ordinary family during the Great

Depression. Each of the family members is powerless in

life and bears isolation from society. Compared with most

researches focusing on the humanity of the characters in

The Glass Menagerie, this study analyzes the alienation of

the family members from different aspects. The analysis

can help readers for a better understanding of the play.

Key Words:

The Wingfields; the Great Depression; alienation;

isolation

Table of Contents

1. Introduction 1

1.1 Tennessee William and The Glass Menagerie 1

1.2 Literature review 1

1.3 Thesis structure 2

2. Alienation Defined 4

2.1 Origin of alienation 4

2.2 Application of alienation in literary works 5

3. Alienation of the Wingfields 7

3.1 Alienation of Tom 7

3.2. Alienation of Amanda 10

3.3 Alienation of Laura 13

4. Conclusion 15

Works Cited 16

1. Introduction

1.1 Tennessee William and The Glass Menagerie

Tennessee William, the greatest and most prolific

playwright in postwar era, ushered a new age of American

drama and theatre after his first major success, The Glass

Menagerie. Noted for his poetic cynicism and vivid

frankness, he was also celebrated as a “poet of the human

heart” and the “Laureate of the Outcast” (Roudane 134).

During his life span, he has created 45 full-length plays

and 60 shorter dramas, as well as screenplays, short

stories, letters, essays and volumes of poetry. Among

them, The Glass Menagerie is generally considered as his most

successful. In the play Tennessee William describes three

members in an ordinary family, the Wingfields struggling

for daily subsistence and spiritual existence during

1

Great Depression. Each of the family members, immersed in

their own fantasies, to varying extent, bears frustration

towards their life, isolation from the surrounding world

and people. Amanda, mother of Laura and Tom, who is

helpless about the present situation of the family, seek

comfort in recollecting her good old days when she

courted with the gentlemen in the South. Abandoned by her

husband 16 years ago, she places the entire family burden

on her son, Tom. He is forced to work in a shoe factory

to support the family. He loathes the job in the shoe

factory, but his responsibility towards the family and

his love for Laura leaves him no choice. As to Laura, she

is a timid, lonely girl who withdraws to herself most of

the time, due to her disability. Afraid to meet

strangers, she remains at home and immerses in her own

2

world of glass menagerie. All of them, trapped by the

reality, long to seek change in their life. But their

efforts turn out in vain.

1.2 Literature Review

As the first successful play of Tennessee, The glass

Menagerie won the New York Critics Circle Award as the

best play of the 1945 Broadway season. Since its first

appearance on the stage, a lot of research has been done,

which can be divided into 3 different directions.

Some researchers tend to study The Glass Menagerie in an

autobiographical perspective. In 1964, Francis Donahue

wrote The Dramatic World of Tennessee Williams applying many

materials from the contemporary newspapers and magazines.

He explains that the southern background and family of

3

Tennessee plays an important role in analyzing The Glass

Menagerie (56). A prestigious writer of Chinese origin,

Bai Xianyong, said once, “unlike many other writers,

Tennessee Williams’ plays are so closely related to his

own life that each one of them could be regarded as his

autobiography” (qtd. in Nelson 187).

Meanwhile some researchers focus on the dramatic

devices used in The Glass Menagerie. After reviewing several

works, Anne Marry Corrigan published Memory, Dream, and Myth

in 1976. In this book, Corrigan proved that dramatic

devices were used by Tennessee to emphasize the

impression of memory (89). Another major work of this

perspective is Anne Fleche’s Mimetic Disillusion: Eugene O’Neill,

Tennessee Williams and US Dramatic Realism in 1997, which analyzes

the play from the viewpoint of the perpetual changes in

4

space in order to visualize what space means to its

construction.

Other researchers adopt the myth and archetypal

criticism approach to analyze The Glass Menagerie. Judith J.

Thompson proves that the classical and archetypal

allusions were used in The Glass Menagerie. He states that

“the nature and content of the mythicized memory story

determine the play’s symbolic characterization, mythical

allusions and archetypal image (11). Furthermore, Jeanne

McGlinn’s Tennessee Williams Women: Illusion and Reality, Sexuality and

Love provides a keen observation on The Glass Menagerie from

the myth and archetypal approach.

Throughout the previous studies, researchers mainly

concentrate on the analysis of Tennessee William’s life

and the dramatic devices adopted in the play. Little was

5

done on the analysis of the theme, alienation. Thus, this

paper will analyze the Wingfields’ alienation and its

causes from different aspects.

1.3 Thesis Structure

This paper will be divided into 3 parts. The first

chapter will provide a brief introduction to the author

Tennessee Williams, a summary of the play and a review.

Then, this is followed by the elaboration on alienation

and its application in literary works in the second

chapter. Equipped with all these basic knowledge, the

third chapter focuses on the analysis of the alienation

embodied in Amanda, Laura and Tom and the causes of their

alienation. After the comprehensive analysis, the paper

reaches the conclusion that Amanda, Laura and Tom is

6

alienated in different aspects, owing to social, cultural

and family reasons.

7

2. Alienation Defined

2.1 Origin of Alienation

Alienation is defined variously. In social sense, it

means the individual subject’s estrangement from its

community, society or world; in literary sense, it means

the mental disorders, or interpersonal estrangement, that

is, to make warm relations between people cool or make

oneself dislike; in philosophical sense, it means the

subject developing into the opposite of his owing to his

8

own contractions and being controlled and oppressed by

his opposite. The term alienation has been widely studied

by philosophers since early times and it has been applied

in analyzing modern literary works.

It was Jean Jacques Rousseau who first put forward

the term alienation. He contends that the human has

constantly become twisted, distorted, and dehumanized by

society and government（45）. He directly pointed out the

diseases of commercial life and the resulting corruption

of the arts, sciences, laws and humanity itself and

stated that once the institution of private property was

established in society, great inequality developed and

the alienated individuals who composed society were

exposed as “an assemblage of artificial men with

factitious passions which are the work of all these new

9

relations and have no true foundation in nature”(136). In

Rousseau’s opinion, civilization estranged man from his

natural condition and at last caused alienation in human

relationship (201). Under the modern social system, the

community took the rights of human. The passions and

dreams were deprived by complicated modern social

arrangements.

The founder of modern economics, Adam Smith expanded

Rousseau’s ideas of social alienation. After making a

thorough analysis of the characteristics of the

industrial society, he concluded that alienation was

caused by economic factors (456). For example, the

factory workers, who worked in an assemble line, was

confined by a single simple work for years and gradually

lost their passion towards life and their creativity. In

10

Smith words, “the passion and the happiness were

repressed by the uniformity of the worker’s life”（460）.

As the industry increasingly developed, the

alienation of human also vastly spread. In Smith’s

opinion, the long working hours, single boring work of

the factory life made men isolated, powerless and

deformed (470).

Following Smith’s theory of alienation, Karl Marx

gave his interpretation of alienation. Marx contended

that capitalism was characterized by the separation or

alienation of the workers from what they make, from the

productive process, from their true nature or “species

being and from other people” (qtd. in Meszaros 78). To

workers, work is alien .They gain frustration from daily

work instead of satisfaction and fulfillment. That is

11

because they are bound to do one simple act in the

assemble line for a quiet long time. Their physical and

mental conditions become worse and worse. To work is to

make money in order to live rather than to fulfill the

nature of life. In Marx’s opinion, alienation occurred

when the humanity and natural social development of human

beings were separated from man (qtd. in Meszaros 90).

Causes of alienation could be found in the economic,

political and social aspects of capitalist industrial

life. In his Economic and Philosophic Manuscript of 1844, Karl

Marx described three aspects of alienation:

powerlessness, isolation and self-estrangement. By these,

he meant that men are estranged from the process of work,

the objects they make, and eventually from their species

being (qtd. in Meszaros230).

12

From the above analysis, it is not difficult to

conclude the definition of alienation: due to certain

social and economic force, people gradually lose control

on their lives, isolate from the community and finally

become opposite to their nature.

2.2 Application of Alienation in Literary Works

Defined completely and fundamentally in philosophy,

the theme is widely applied in literary works. The

application of alienation in literary works can be dated

back to the ancient Greek. It is first detected in the

tragedy “Oedipus” by Sophocles. In the tragedy, the

heroin Oedipus’s destiny is determined by God. On one

hand he actually understands the nature judging from his

answer of Sphinx, but on the other hand he violates the

13

nature by killing his father and sleeping with his

mother. He has no control of his own life and later

isolates from the society and eventually becomes the

archetype of self-alienation. In this period, the concept

of alienation also appeared in the Bible. It is recorded

that the followers are so tightly controlled by

omniscient God in daily life that they lose themselves.

Coming to self-awareness, the followers demand the rights

to act on their own and eventually being themselves.

Alienation does not exist only within people but also

between people. In Timon of Athens, Shakespeare narrates a

crowd of people who abandon their virtues and dignities

for Timon’s money. It is the money that causes alienation

between people.

After 1918, America underwent tremendous economic

14

development. Unaccustomed to the rapid pace of life, many

people at that time experienced some kind of

psychological crisis. Therefore, more and more American

writers focused on the inwards world of characters. Thus,

alienation and isolation were common themes in post-war

American drama. Influenced by the trend, Williams created

many famous dramas including The Glass Menagerie. He depicted

a lot of vivid alienated characters. Then in the early

twentieth century, the modernist movement completely

changed the way that art and literature were perceived in

western culture. The themes expressed in modernism were

diverse, complex and difficult to understand, among which

existed alienation. The theme could be found in The Dead

by James Joyce, The Waste Land by T.S. Eliot and Hairy Ape

and Long Day’s Journey into Night by Eugene O’Neil. In those

15

works, writers expressed that men were ruled by external

things, which caused alienation; and alienation existed

not only in people but also between people.

3. Alienation of the Wingfields

Abandoned by Mr. Wingfield 16 years ago, the

Wingfilds live a hard life both in material and in

spirit. During the Great Depression, they have been

reduced to something approaching a subsistence existence.

16

Tom, enthusiastic about adventures, feels trapped by his

family and his plain job in a shoe factory. Amanda, a

domineering and controlling mother, clings to her

memories of her lost youth and a genteel past that is in

harsh conflict with her reduced circumstances. Laura, who

is crippled, hides in the dim family apartment creating a

fantasy world with her glass menagerie. All of them are

alienated in different aspects. Tom’s alienation is

embodied in that he is powerless of his life and lives in

opposite to his nature; Amanda’s alienation lies in that

she isolates from her life; Laura’s alienation is

detected from her isolation from the community.

3.1 Alienation of Tom

The alienation of Tom is embodied through his

17

powerlessness of his life and lives in opposite to his

nature. Mr. Wingfield, Tom’s father abandoned the family

16 years ago and except for a postcard from Mexico, has

never been heard from. Therefore, as soon as Tom came of

age, Tom substituted for his father as the breadwinner by

working in Continental Shoemakers. Lack of creativity and

diversity, Tom’s job there is oppressive to him. He says

in the play, “whenever I pick up a shoe, I shudder a

little thinking how short life is and what I am doing!

Whatever that means, I know it does not mean shoes except

as something to wear on a traveler’s feet!”(Williams 68).

In his deep heart, he would rather die than work

there. In the play he even shows his envy for the dead

because they do not have to work there. But the

responsibility towards the family leaves him no choice.

18

In a furious quarrel with Amanda, Tom voices his true

idea out by saying:

You think I want to spend fifty-five

years down therein that –celotex interior!

with –fluorescent-tubes! Look! I would

rather somebody picked up a crowbar and

battered out my brains than go back

mornings! I go! Every time you come in

yelling that God damn ‘Rise and Shine!’ I

say to myself, ‘How lucky dead people are!

‘But I get up all that I dream of doing

and being ever! And you say self-selfs’

all I think of. Why listen, if self is

what I thought of, Mother, I would be

where he is-GONE. (Williams 61)

19

From the above argument, we can clearly see Tom’s

hatred towards his job. He is a man by instinct, “a

lover, a hunter, a fighter” and the warehouse provides

none of these instincts. The nature of himself calls him

to seek adventures but the love and responsibility for

the family forces him to go to work every day. He lives

just in opposite to his nature. He calls himself “a slave

of the work” (Williams 60) in the play for he gains

nothing but 65 dollars from the job. The job he does

requires no skills and creativity but simple-mind and

diligence, owing to the invention of the machines and

assembly line of production. In the factory Tom is

assigned with a specific task at a stable location in the

assembly line and is ordered to do one simple task

repeatedly for months and even for years. The work

20

provides him with no spiritual fulfillment and

satisfaction, which gradually leads to his depression

towards life. Just as Adam Smith says that “the passion

and the happiness were repressed by the uniformity of the

workers’ life” (Smith 460). Tom tries to add diversity to

his work by writing a poem in the lids of shoeboxes, for

which he gets fired at last.

Due to his work and family pressure, Tom gradually

became alienated in that he loses control of his own

life. Tied down to a mindless job and a demanding family,

he views his life in the family and at the shoe factory

as a kind of coffin-cramped, suffocating and morbid:

But the wonderful trick of all was the

coffin trick. We nailed him into a

coffin and he got out of the coffin

21

without removing one nail. There is a

trick that would come in handy for me-

get me out of this two-by-four

situation! You know it do not take much

intelligence to get yourself into a

nailed-up coffin (Williams 56)

To escape from his boring work and reality, Tom seeks

refuge in movies and novels, which is greatly forbidden

by his mother Amanda. He loves reading D.H. Lawrence’s

works, which are regarded as “the hideous book by that

insane Mr. Lawrence” (Williams 46). She returns the book

to the library without Tom’s permission by claiming that

“she will not allow such filth brought into her house.

No, no, no, no” (Williams 47). With no books to read, Tom

turns to movies to seek comfort and adventure.

22

However, his freedom to go to movies is restricted by

Amanda. No way to release the pressure of life, Tom goes

to cinema to escape from the reality and from Amanda’s

nagging inquisition and commands. He also uses movies as

a type of adventure to compensate for his own dull life.

In the play, Tom says to Amanda that the reason why he

goes to movies “because I like adventure. Adventure is

something I do not have much at work, so I go to the

movies” (Williams 50). However, on Amanda’s part, Tom’s

going to movies is a very selfish behavior. She

constantly warns Tom that by coming home late and

depriving himself of sleep, he is endangering his job and

therefore the family security, for which she often

quarrels with Tom. She is afraid of Tom’s losing job and

more importantly she fears that Tom may desert the family

23

if he goes out as much as possible just as her husband,

Mr. Wingfield did. Mr. Wingfield left the family 16 years

ago. With that in mind, it seems reasonable that she is

suspicious when Tom stays mentally and physically into

any world outside their cramped apartment and gradually

interferes unduly with Tom’s private life.

Tom’s alienation is rooted in the nature of the

capitalist society. Just as Rousseau says that “ever

since the private property was established in capitalist

society, great inequality developed” (87). In capitalist

society, the capitalists are in charge of the majority of

capital with which they can afford machines, raw

materials and workers. Therefore, they set up factories

and companies to make money. The ordinary people, with a

small amount of money in hand, are left no choice but to

24

be employed by the capitalists to do certain work. In

most cases, they have no freedom to choose their work

place and the way they complete their task. And as the

industry develops, new machines and new production line

come into being. In order to amplify profit margin, the

capitalists adopt the assembly line in which every worker

is charge of one simple task at a stable position. In

this way, the production productivity increases greatly

and more profits are made in a short time. While on

workers’ part, they have to repeat one act for a long

time. They gain no spiritual fulfillment from work, which

results in the depression of workers. Regardless of

workers’ physical and mental conditions, capitalists are

optimistic with increasing productivity and the

increasing amount of economic profit. The profits they

25

have made help the society advance in a way that is based

on the accumulation of money instead of the natural

development of human. It is the reason why people get

alienated in accordance with Marx’s theory that is

alienation occurred when the humanity and natural social

development of human being were separated from man

(Meszaros 90).

3.2. Alienation of Amanda

Amanda’s alienation lies in that she isolates from

her life. Amanda, the mother of the Wingfield family, is

a typical Southern belle, as she is reared up in the

Mississippi Delta. However, in her life in St. Louis, she

still clings frantically to her youth and the South. She

maintains the southern way of talking and behaving with

26

an air of priority and delicacy; she constantly tells Tom

and Laura her story of receiving 17 gentlemen; she

manages to find a gentleman caller for Laura and she

denies the usefulness of modern technology. All of these

show her isolation from her life in St. Louis.

She tries to remain Southern tradition in the

Wingfield’s tenement. Her way of speech, dress and action

are typically southern. In the play, she insists on

Laura’s keeping seat at dinner and proclaims, “No,

sister, no sister, you be the lady this time and I will

be the darky” (103). When the gentleman caller Jim

visits, Amanda is dressed in the girlish frock of yellow

voile with blue silk sash with a bunch of jonquils on her

arm, which is a typical Southern way.

Throughout the whole play, she constantly reminds

27

readers that she belongs to an earlier time on her

family’s plantation in Mississippi. She constantly

explains to Tom and Laura:

One Sunday afternoon in Blue Mountain

your mother received 17 gentlemen

callers! Sometimes there are not chairs

enough to accommodate them all. We had

to send the niggers to bring in folding

chairs from parish house. (Williams 16)

The gentlemen callers are as she never gets tired

of saying “some of the most prominent young planters

of Mississippi Delta-planters or sons of planters”

(Williams 17). Tom and Laura are so familiar with this

story that once Amanda starts it, they know exactly

what comes next. The reason Amanda clings to her youth

28

is because she finds security in her past when she is

surrounded by chivalric men who want to marry her. In

reality, she lives a hard life. Haunted by the idea

that Tom may abandon the family, she often quarrels

with Tom. With a shy and disabled daughter, she

manages to pave the way for her by sending her to a

business school. But, to her disappointment, her

efforts turn out in vain. Desperate about the reality,

she constantly seeks comfort in her youth, which

eventually leads to her isolation from her life in St.

Louis.

Realizing that Laura is incapable of living on

her own, she forces Tom to invite a gentleman caller

home and strongly believes that Laura’s life can be

changed by this gentleman caller. The way she manages

29

a future for Laura is typically Southern. She

maintains the traditional Southern thought that a

gentleman caller could become a savior who could

rescue her daughter into security. It seems apparent

that unconscious of the social development she still

lives in her youth time and copes with her situation

in a Southern way. She tells Jim O’Conner, the

gentleman caller, her new audience, that “in the South

we had so many servants. Gone, gone, and gone. All

vestige of gracious living! Gone Completely! I was not

prepared for what the future brought me. All of my

gentleman callers were sons of planters” (Williams

96). She tells truth to Jim that when her southern

life vanishes, she is at a loss of the reality. With

no way to turn to, she clings to the Southern

30

tradition in a frantic way. Apart from her southern

way of conduct and coping with problems, Amanda’s

alienation lies in her denial of modern technology.

Once the electricity went out in the room, she says to

Jim, “isn’t electricity is a mysterious thing? Some

people say that science clears up all mysteries for

us. In my opinion, it just creates more” (Williams

97). From this we can see that she is totally out of

her element in a modern environment.

The isolation of Amanda’s stems from the society at

that time. When talking about the South of America, such

words as honor, courtesy, chivalry and generosity come to

our mind. The Southerners cherish these values very much.

What is more, they have a strong sense of weight of

history and are loyal to heir traditions. They believe

31

that their ancestors are aristocrats from Europe with the

dream to build an earthly paradise in the new world. This

belief adds myth and superiority to the Southern culture.

In spite of their failure in the Civil War, the

Southerners still hold strong belief in their culture.

However, with the rapid progress of industrialization and

the collapse of their conception on values and morality,

Southerners fall into a mist. They are very nostalgic

about what has gone, and are unable to face the changed

reality. The plantation on which their myth comes from is

replaced by factories and corporations. During the new

era, a different ideology rules the South. It is a

northern ideology that success is judged from how much

money the person hold. So in order to be successful, a

lot of Southern men seek work outside and gradually

32

conform to the modern society. While for the Southern

belle, to adapt to the modern society is very difficult.

In the old South, the plantation is an independent social

unit, self-contained and largely self-sufficient. Men in

the family take control of it. Women live a life of

dependency. They are mainly responsible for cleaning

house and taking care of babies. But as the old economic

pattern has broken down, as Amanda women are compelled to

make money outside, too. For them, it is a big challenge

both physically and psychologically. Used to staying at

home and the old cultural values, the sudden exposure to

society tortures them a lot. No way to escape from the

harsh reality, some women lives in fantasy of the Old

South therefore isolates from the real life. Amanda is

one of them.

33

3.3 Alienation of Laura

Laura’s alienation is detected from her isolation

from the community. Laura is so fragile that she is

afraid of contacting the real world.

A childhood illness has left her crippled. One of her

leg is slightly shorter than the other, and is held in a

brace. Stemming from this, Laura’s separation increases

she is like a piece of her own glass collection, too

exquisitely fragile to move from the shelf.

When Amanda sends her out to get butter, Laura dreads

going, for she always fears facing the outside world. In

her nervousness, she trips on the fire-escape steps.

In high school, she was terribly shy and stuck by

herself, thinking she had not much luck at making

34

friends. What is worse, she is thrown into great pain

whenever she had to clump all the way up the aisle of the

singing classroom with everyone watching. In her eyes,

everyone in the classroom notices her limp and laughs at

her. Eventually during her last semester in high school,

she becomes nervously ill, fails her exam and does not

graduate. However, after six years when one of Laura’s

classmates, Jim pays a visit to her household, he tells

Laura that he even does not notice Laura’s clumping,

which is unbelievable to Laura. She says to Jim in the

play that “it was hard for me to go upstairs. I had that

brace on my leg and it clumped so loud; to me it sounded

like thunder” (Williams 55). To Laura’s surprise, Jim

responds that “I never heard any clumping” (Williams 55)

In fact, it is Laura’s oversensitive nature makes her

35

think that everyone notices her limp. She has magnified

her limp until it affects her entire personality.

Incapable of getting over it, she is afraid of meeting

people in the real world and gradually turns into nerve

breakdown.

To prepare Laura for a business career, Amanda makes

Laura enroll in a business school. While learning typing,

Laura was so nervous that her hands shake hard and she

could not hit the right key of the typewriter. The first

time she has a speed test, she broke down completely.

According to her teacher in the business school, “she was

sick at the stomach and almost had to be carried to the

washroom” (Williams 45). Since then, she plays truant

every day strolling in the museum, zoo and greenhouse

where she could avoid contact with people. Amanda once

36

took her to the Young People’s League at the church, but

there she spoke to nobody and nobody spoke to her.

While at home, Laura enjoys playing with the

collection of glass animals and looking at an old

Victoria photograph. Laura resigns herself from the

outside world into the shelter, her glass menagerie and

the photograph for they serve well to relieve Laura’s

anxiety. She tells Tom that she loves the glass menagerie

because “I have not heard argument from them” (Williams

56). From this, we can see that the family tension

attributes to Laura’s isolation from the world. With no

father to encourage her and love her, Laura loses her

self-esteem and the quarrels between Tom and Amanda over

Tom’s job adds her fear towards the outside world.

From the above comprehensive analysis, it is clearly

37

seen that all the Wingfields all bear alienation in

different aspects, due to cultural, social and family

reasons. Tom, burdened with the responsibility of

supporting the family, gradually loses his control of his

life and becomes opposite to his nature. Amanda, immersed

in her youth and the old South, isolates from her real

life in St. Louis. Laura, the timid and disable girl,

afraid of contacting with the real world, lives in her

own world of glass menagerie.

38

4. Conclusion

The thesis mainly analyzes the theme of alienation in

The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams. Based on the

definition of alienation, the paper interprets that the

three members in the Wingfield family, Tom, Amanda, Laura

are alienated in different aspects, due to social,

cultural and family reasons.

Tom, fond of literature and adventure, is compelled

to keep a dull job at the shoe factory by his

responsibility towards the family and he eventually loses

control of his life, which is the embodiment of his

alienation. By combining the definition of alienation and

39

the social environment at Tom’s time, it is concluded

that the nature of the capitalist’s society causes Tom’s

alienation. Amanda, a typical southern belle, trapped by

the cruel reality, seeks comfort from her glorious past

and causes her isolation from her life, which is the

embodiment of her alienation. Laura, a fragile and

terribly shy girl with a crippled leg, withdraws

completely to her own world made of glass animals and

eventually isolates from the society. It is her

disability and the family environment cause her isolation

from the society, which is just the embodiment of her

alienation.

40

Works Cited

Corrign, Mary Ann. Memory, Dream, and Myth in the Plays of

Tennessee Williams.

London: Renascence Spring, 1975.

Donahue, Francis. The Dramatic World of Tennessee Williams. New

York: Frederick Ungar, 1964.

Feuerlicht, Ignace. Alienation: From the Past to the Future.

41

Westport: Greenwood Press, 1978.

Gilmour, Robert S. Lamb, Robert. Political Alienation in

Contemporary America. New York: St.Martin’s press, 1975.

McElroy, Davis Dunbar. Existentialism and Modern Literature an Essay

in Existential Criticism. New York: Philosophical Library,

1963.

Nelson, Benjamin. Tennessee Williams: His Life and Work. London:

Peter Owen Ltd, 1967.

McGlinn, Jeannee M. Tennessee Williams’ Women: Illusion and reality,

Sexuality and Love. Columbus: University Press of

Mississippi, 1977.

Meszaros, Istvan Marx’s Theory of Alienation. London: Merlin

Press London, 1975.

Presley, Delma E. The Glass Menagerie: An American Memory.

Boston: A division of G.K.Hall and Co. and Twain

42

Publishers, 1990.

Roudane, Matthew, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Tennessee

Williams. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language

Education, 2000.

Rousseau, Jean Jacques. On the Origin of Inequality. London:

Penguin Classics, 1990.

Smith Adam. The Wealth of Nations. New York: Bantam Classics,

2003.

Thompson Judith J. Tennessee Williams’ Plays Memory, Myth and

Symbol. New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 1950.

Williams Tennessee. The Glass Menagerie. London: Penguin

Classics, 2009.

赵赵赵. 《20 赵赵赵赵赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵： 》. 赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵：，2004.

赵 赵. 赵赵赵赵赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵《 》： . 赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵：，2006.

赵赵赵. 《20 赵赵赵赵赵赵》. 赵赵 赵赵赵赵赵赵赵赵：，2002.

43