The Glass Menagerie

Characters and Themes

Characters

Tom Wingfield. . . The narrator and a character in the play. He works at a shoe warehouse, but has dreams of traveling.

Amanda Wingfield. . . .the mother. She grew up in the South and is very disappointed with her present life. She escapes to the past days of glory.

Laura Wingfield. . . The daughter. She is very timid and childlike, not having the ability to relate with others very well.

Father (picture—but he is absent from the family.)

1. Deception

Laura’s experience in business college causes her to “deceive” her mother. . . Note Amanda’s comment upon returning to the apartment after she has found out the truth.

Tom, coming home drunk, talks about a magician he saw on stage. Note again the tricks that he performed.

Themes in The Glass Menagerie

In Tom’s opening monologue he calls himself a magician, someone having tricks up his sleeve, a person who presents truth in the form of illusion.

Amanda fixes everything in the apartment in order to make a good impression on the “gentleman caller.” She attempts to make Laura into a person she cannot become.

The Outcomes of Deception

Deception is the most subtle of all satanic strongholds. Have you ever noticed that most people with addictive behaviors lie to themselves and others almost continuously? The alcoholic lies about his drinking, the anorexic lies about her eating, and the sex offender lies about his behavior. Satan is called the Father of lies (John 8:44).

2. Escape From RealityAmanda escapes to her past. . .

Southern belle, gentleman callers, life of propriety etc.

Tom goes regularly to the movies and the bars; he escapes into books and writing poetry.

Laura has childlike dreams. . . She plays old records and looks at her glass collection.

3. Religious ThemesThe preponderance of Christian

symbolism in The Glass Menagerie establishes this as an important aspect for the playwright, Tennessee Williams. Of primary interest, relative to the author’s theology is the notion that God does not communicate directly with the individual, but He nevertheless, influences him. Note the picture of the missing father on the wall of the Wingfield apartment.

Some critics suggest the final image of Amanda comforting Laura are reminiscent of the Pieta

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxHnRfhDmrk

Examples of Symbols & Religious Symbols in The Glass Menagerie

1. Father: Absent Head of Household2. Paradise Dance Hall3. “The Companion”. . .name of

tawdry magazine Amanda attempts to sell

4. Storm that is in the background5. The Glass Menagerie itself6. Wishing on the Moon7. Religious symbols:

a. Candlestickb. “paradise”c. Fish on Fridayd. The gentleman caller who acts as a

“savior” for Laura and AmandaLaura and Amanda

Jim’s shadow on the wall. . . A crossGentleman caller brings Life saver and wineBaptized myselfElectricity. . . Mysterious. . .”plunged into everlasting darkness”

Meaning of Relationships“The exploration of heaven shall also include our

knowing of each other. How can love be complete without the freedom to be naked and unashamed? More than unashamed, we shall be celebrated. It is one of the sorrows of our present life; the separation we feel even from those closest to us. Married people can be the loneliest on earth, not for some failure of the marriage, but because they have tasted the best there is of human relationships and know it is not all it was meant to be.” John Eldridge

“We wake, if ever we wake at all, to mystery.”Annie Dillard

Tennessee Williams on Human Nature

“For the sins of the world are really only its partialities, and these are what sufferings must atone for. . . The nature of man is full of such makeshift arrangements, devised by himself to cover his incompletion. He feels a part of himself to be like a missing wall or a room left unfurnished and he tries as well as he can to make up for it. The use of imagination, resorting to dreams or the loftier purpose of art, is a mask he devises to cover his incompletion. . .”

Read from Donald Miller. . . “A Million Miles”

Theme of Redemption?As mentioned religious symbolism is very significant in

Williams’ play. All Christians, especially suffering ones, await the coming of the savior, and this is the role in which Amanda casts Jim O’Connor. Scene 5, in which Tom breaks the news that Jim is coming for dinner, begins with a type of “Annunciation,” a term which refers to the message brought by the angel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary.

The person needing redemption is Laura (at least in her mother’s thinking!) According to the stage directions the light that shines on her during the play should have “a peculiar pristine clarity, such as light used in the early religious portraits of female saints and madonnas.” So is she the one in need of redemption, or the one who is closest to what is truth?

Again think of fragmentation in human lives/ relationships:

Whereas Christ the savior is presented in Christian Scriptures as the light of the world, in The Glass Menagerie the lights seem to be “going out.” Note Amanda’s comment about being “plunged into everlasting darkness.”

Like many postmodern compositions, Williams recognizes the desperate needs of the human condition, but does not present a real possibility for redemption.

Innocence Lost

Tom’s final monologue. . . He is still haunted by his sister and her childlike sense of innocence. Something about his words resonate with a deeper truth about the meaning of life than anything he has experienced in his wanderings. . . where everything has been “fragmented.”

Compare to Other Authors

Flannery O’Connor? Recall two or three of her stories:

“Good Country People”“A Good Man Is Hard to Find”Or how about Upton Sinclair: Oil. . . Movie “There Will Be Blood”