The psychology of males who are abusive to women: Analysing A Streetcar Named Desire

There are different types of abuse such as sexual, emotional, physical and more but from what I have read and seen, Mr. Stanley Kowalski is more emotionally abusive. These men tend to intimidate, humiliate (Scene 8), threat, blame and sometimes isolate their partners from the outer world. Abusers can control it and don’t do it when it wouldn’t benefit them, so it’s not like a type of sickness which can’t be controlled; it’s all in their mind. Many times they aren’t ashamed of being abusive but they don’t say it. They say it in another way, for example, “Yes, sometimes I slap her to put her on her place”. Abusers are more anxious, nervous, irritable, excitable, moody, defensive, self-centered, and hasty. The social class difference between Blanche and Stanley is what irritates him and makes him what he is. Blanche insulting him in an indirect way bothers him.

Tennesse Williams´ life notes

Author of “A Streetcar Named Desire” - Tennessee Williams

• The Glass Menagerie was Tennessee’s first successful play
• He hated being a celebrity
• Declared one of the best play writers
• “Many people who reach glory at an early age realize the emptiness of fame”
• Didn’t like praise, it annoyed him and made him think people were fake towards him
• After an eye operation he viewed his life more clearly, literally and figuratively
• Then he escaped to Mexico to be his former self again.
• His father was a violent man
• He didn’t have the “perfect” family. Had a sister called Rose
• Dad was violent and alcoholic. Mum was smooth and caring.
• Rose withdrew to a private mental world, she became schizophrenic.
• Tennessee blamed himself for her madness
• Tennessee was homosexual
• In Streetcar, he shaped the story from his own experience
• He hardly disguised his parents, his sister and himself when he cast them as characters on the stage. Places where he lived became settings.
• He changed his name and over the years he offered varying explanations for the new name.
• Most of Tennessee’s characters are based on real people in his life, many of them family members.
• During his last years Williams kept writing, but one plat after the other failed.
• To ease pain he turned to drinks and drugs.
• He needed several operations for cataracts.
• The new plays received terrible notices, driving him in to deeper addiction.
• He died in a New York hotel room in 1983
• Police reports say that pill were found under his body