Rylee Nepple

Sanford

AP Lit 4th

February 12, 2021

A Streetcar Named Desire

8. Deception (CHR 1E)

In the play A Streetcar Named Desire, Tennessee Williams writes Blanche in a way that

disables the audience from agreeing on whether she was a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ person. Blanche

displays many conflicting personality traits and attempts to portray herself as a better person than

she is. By hiding her negative traits, Blanche creates more uncertainty in the evaluation of her

character. She tries to protect herself from her past filled with secrets, but in doing so ends up

hurting herself and those around her. Although Blanche has good intentions, she cannot escape

her past, which is vital to the work as a whole. Nearly the entire story is centered around Blanche

and the effect that she is having on the lifestyle of her younger sister, Stella. Stella and her

husband Stanley provide for Blanche while she stays with them, but Blanche’s shady past creates

tension in the family and forces Stella to make difficult decisions. Throughout the text, the reader

learns more about Blanche’s true motives and her hidden past, causing her to be viewed as a

morally ambiguous character. Williams uses these aspects to build up the recurring idea that

everybody has secrets, and it is how you deal with those secrets that define your character.

It is hard to say whether Blanche was a ‘bad person’. She displayed many negative traits

and made some questionable decisions, such as lying about how she lost her job, but did so with
good intent. Throughout the text, Williams writes Blanche with a very flirtatious personality, as

she constantly tries to be the center of attention and strives to attract the male gaze. The reader is

informed early on that Blanche lies about her age and is quite concerned with her looks.

However, these traits do not inherently make Blanche a bad person. It is not until the reader

discovers Blanche’s past relationship with a seventeen-year-old student and her promiscuous

reputation at the Flamingo Hotel that they begin to see her flirtation in a negative light. Because

Williams chose to hold off these secrets of Blanche’s past, the reader already has an opinion of

the character before the negative traits are revealed. This tactic is used to show that Blanche

cannot be labeled solely as a bad person. In the time period of the play, it was expected that

women settle down and get married to a man who will provide for their family. These are not the

standards today, and although Blanche wanted to follow these standards, that is not the lifestyle

she lived. As Williams continues to divulge more information about Blanche’s past, her moral

ambiguity is built up. The reader knows that Blanche has lied, but they also know that she did it

to protect herself. Blanche thought the only way to get a fresh start was to hide her past from her

family. She keeps secrets from those she cares about, and although she tries to be a better person,

the reader can slowly see her past toxicity creep back in when she kisses the young newsboy. As

Blanche pursues a relationship with Mitch- one of Stanley’s close friends, she continues to keep

secrets and lie, and the reader can infer that Blanche will not be able to grow out of her old ways.

Because of this, we cast the character in a negative light, thinking that the bad traits outweigh the

good. However, Blanche did not want things to go the way they did, as she was trying to start

over and be happy but was unable to escape her old habits. She does not know how to deal with

her past in a healthy manner, but creates mystery around her character by keeping secrets,
causing Blanche to be perceived as both a good and bad character, thus building up her moral

ambiguity.

The moral ambiguity Blanche displays is essential to the plot of the work as a whole.

Blanche’s arrival completely uproots Stanley and Stella’s life, and they must learn how to live

with her. They soon learn that Blanche has lost Belle Reve and is very distressed about it. Her

first husband died, and she lost her job, both adding to her stress levels. Stella was unaware of

Blanche’s intention to stay in town for an extended period of time but is trying to help her sister

cope with the loss. However, Blanche is unable to keep up her false personality and retain her

secrets while living in Stanley’s house. From the initial introduction, Blanche butts heads with

Stanley, causing him to dig into her past, revealing her secrets. What Blanche once kept hidden,

from her family and herself, is now out in the open. Stella knows the truth, and Blanche begins to

unravel, descending into insanity. She has defined herself on the premise of these secrets for so

long she does not know how to handle the fact that her family knows the truth. She loses her

sense of self and the budding relationship with Mitch. After Stanley reveals Blanche’s history,

Mitch is no longer interested in her, causing her to spiral even further into her delusions. She

cannot separate the world she built out of secrets from the truth, causing her to become out-of-

touch with reality. Stella can no longer take care of her sister if she wants to stay with her

husband and child, which forces Stella to send Blanche to a mental rehabilitation center to get

help she needs. All these decisions have a domino effect, and they all spring from the same

source- Blanche’s moral ambiguity. By hiding secrets, Blanche only made it more difficult for

her to form solid relationships with her family. Stella is unable to trust Blanche, but also feels

distrust from Stanley. Ultimately, even Stella could not determine if her sister’s intentions were

pure. Blanche’s entire character is defined by the past that she cannot escape and all the
decisions she makes throughout the work showcase that. Although Blanche means well and does

not want to hurt anybody, she cannot restrain herself from the urge to lie about herself and her

past. Lying and secret keeping are what define her personality, and once that is exposed, Blanche

cannot keep herself together.

Although Blanche’s actions throughout the play are not all inherently negative, we know

what she has done in the past, therefore we cannot help but to see them that way. Blanche strives

to be a good person and wants to have a good relationship with Stella, but her negative past

keeps dragging her back down, creating a morally ambiguous character that is neither 100%

good nor bad. The plot centers around Blanche and how the other characters react to her choices,

so without the questionable decisions she makes, there would be no story to tell. Blanche was

unable to keep secrets in a healthy manner, and because she continually lets these secrets control

her, her character is defined by the past she cannot escape.