(Malfi/Streetcar) Power
- Created by: NHow02
- Created on: 25-03-19 14:14
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- Power
- Malfi
- 'Like plum trees that grow crooked over standing pools'
- 'o'erladen with fruit.'
- Bible states 'you will recognise them (Jesus's followers) by their fruits'
- Weight of Upper Classes ('fruit') creates a crooked class system
- Blble states 'nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit'
- Lucy Webster: A 'world that is more sinned against than sinning'
- Natural image used to describe an unnatural society, creates a recessive effect (Like Stanley)
- Simile references the 'tree of life' in the Garden of Eden and the 'forbidden fruit'
- Lack of sustenance/ nutrients. Sycophants seek further corruption
- 'Standing' suggests contamination + disease
- 'pools' incites reflection/ judgement
- 'o'erladen with fruit.'
- 'like diamonds we are cut with our own dust'
- High Society dances 'silently behind crystal panels' suggesting 'a sort of transparent mirror'
- Webster's zealous & thematic use of jewel symbolism
- Webster uses this play to reflect the secrecy & corruption of the English court
- 'own dust' reflects incestuous feelings
- Elizabethan belief that fate was written in the stars/ predetermined by God
- Elizabethan belief that when one twin dies the other's soul does as well
- 'I have this night digged up a mandrake'
- Aphrodisiac + poison (once uprooted it drives someone insane)
- TS Eliot: Webster always saw the 'skull beneath the skin'
- Webster uses this play to reflect the secrecy & corruption of the English court
- TS Eliot: Webster always saw the 'skull beneath the skin'
- Aphrodisiac + poison (once uprooted it drives someone insane)
- All defined by materialism and wealth. (Webster fails to give her a name - a prize to be won)
- Status of high society was a mask disguising corruption
- Ferdinand recites a final couplet when he dies
- Virtue is often described in this period as that which 'shines forth'
- High Society dances 'silently behind crystal panels' suggesting 'a sort of transparent mirror'
- 'Like plum trees that grow crooked over standing pools'
- Streetcar
- 'primary colours'/'raw colours of childhood's spectrum'
- 'red stained package'
- Men were typically the breadwinners and provided for the family
- Represents Stanley as a predator (dangerous to women/ Blanche)
- Eric Bentley sees the play as a clash of "species"
- The jungle reference suggests these attitudes are still backward
- Darwinian idea of 'survival of the fittest'
- 'them coloured lights'
- Colloquial speech, Stanley represents a recessive society (power based on ignorance)
- New Orleans was seen as a 'melting pot' of cultural influences
- Sexual Euphemism
- Colloquial speech, Stanley represents a recessive society (power based on ignorance)
- 'primary' excludes other players as collateral damage
- 'childhood' could suggest that for men, the world is a playground, and women are the victims
- 'Primary' alludes to the patriarchal society of post-WW2 America (men replaced women in industry)
- 'red stained package'
- 'sunken treasures'/ 'rhinestone tiara'
- Juxtaposition of cheapness with a royal symbol creates an affected effect
- Ironic image - wants to be seen as a 'queen' of high society
- Patriarchal/ social opinions would view her as of the lowest class, no better than a prostitute
- Superiority stems from Southern upbringing at 'Belle Reve'
- After the Civil War, Southern wealth melted away as slave labour was abolished by Lincoln in 1863
- Stanley sees her as a 'pirate' as her existence violates his social views
- After the Civil War, Southern wealth melted away as slave labour was abolished by Lincoln in 1863
- Manipulation
- 'Tarantulas Arms'
- Metaphor for fallen women in society no longer treated as humans
- Southern Gothic literature focused on grotesque, supernatural themes & damaged, delusional characters
- Metaphor for fallen women in society no longer treated as humans
- 'Tarantulas Arms'
- 'primary colours'/'raw colours of childhood's spectrum'
- Malfi
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