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StreetMalf - Madness - Coggle Diagram

- - - - it is clear that Ferdinand has incestuous feelings for his sister
      - in fact, in a later German version of the play in 1946, the playwright includes a prologue where Ferdinand confesses his incestuous love to his sister
      - Moreover, Ferdinand chooses to make the family from Spain, instead of from Italy. Spain was renowned for its incestuous royal Habsburg family who inbred for generations, leading to grotesque birth defects
      - between 1500 and 1700, it is estimated that 80% of marriages in the Habsburgs were incestuous
      - Ferdinand imagines his sister's sex with a 'strong thighed bargeman' which betrays his jealousy and insecurity
      - his odd incestuous feelings lead to his madness, his 'most perverse and turbulent nature'
      - Bliss speaks of Ferdinand's 'impassioned raving'
      - ferdinand's madness is caused by his 'dark web of lust' (Dusinberre) around his sister, his own kind of 'sexual depravity' like Blanche
      - Nandor Fodor's "Lycanthropy as a Psychic Mechanism" argues that Ferdinand's type of lycanthropy can be seen as "self-denunciation" or the freeing of one's guilt.
- - - - social exclusion due to promiscuity, the rejection of Mitch who represented her path to normality and safety
        
        Williams said to his agent that this play is about 'the destructive power of society on the sensitive, non-conforming individual'
        
        Blanche certainly does not conform, as she represents a so-called Southern Belle who is actually promiscuous, and this behaviour leads to her exclusion
        
        according to Elaine Taylor May, at this time government officials believed there to be a 'direct connection between communism and sexual depravity', which could be promiscuity or homosexuality
        
        there was a climate of hostility towards communism at this time, as the first showing of the play was in the same year as the beginning of the Cold War
        
        thus, the promiscuous and gay were outcast and feared, blamed for society's problems as akin to the 'red scare'
        
        Williams himself was gay, and so has used the character of Blanche to showcase the effects of such social exclusion, he has frequently said 'I am Blanche Dubois'
        
        Williams and Blanche both represent different aspects of sexual depravity
        
        Blanche sleeps with 'a series of men from travelling salesmen to soldiers' with the sibilance emphasising the extent of her sexual nature
        
        Blanche goes mad by taking 'gallant and desperate refuge in a magical life she has invented for herself' (Chapman) as she doesn't want realism 'I want magic!'
        
        Blanche escapes the judgement of society by putting on a facade and pretending her problems and past do not exist
        
        however, it is this past that causes Micth to say she is 'not clean enough', eliminating the chance for them to be wed and settle down
        
        Mitch had represented hope for Blanche to change her life, she relied on him and what he represented
        
        'whenever Blanche is stuck in trouble, men are always the ones to whom she resorts' (fang)
      - the rape of Stanley
        
        When Stanley rapes Blanche, she is described as an 'inert figure'
        
        the adjective of 'inert' showcases her powerlessness, as Stanley has broken her psyche and spirit, making her mad
        
        some critics have argued that the rape of Blanche is symbolic of the destruction of the Old South, as Stanley representing the New South has physically destroyed her, causing her madness
        
        Williams has used 'the tragedy of Blanche DuBois to illustrate the changing face of the post war south' (Brilley)
        
        because of the loss of her old power, Blanche has gone mad
        
        in the first performance of the play, audiences cheered at the rape of Blanche, and felt that 'a madwoman...had been successfully exorcised' (Spector)
        
        This showcases how Williams wanted to raise awareness to the reality of normalised rape and domestic violence in relationships, and how this could break a person's spirit and lead to madness
        
        'Stanley is an agent of Blanche's destruction' (Lart)