Free Glass Menagerie Essays: Parallels to Williams Life and Symbolism :: The Glass Menagerie

The Glass Menagerie Parallels to Williams deportment and Use of Symbolism The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams is a tinge play about the lost dreams of a southern family and their struggle to lead reality. The play is a memory play and therefore very poetic in mood, setting, and dialogue. Tom Wingfield serves as the narrator as well as a character in the play. Tom lives with his Southern belle mother, Amanda, and his painfully incertain sister, Laura. The action of the play revolves around Amandas search to find Laura a gentleman caller. The Glass Menageries plot closely mirrors actual events in the authors life. Because Williams related so well to the characters and situations, he was able to beautifully portray the plays theme through and through his creative use of symbolism. The Glass Menagerie reflects Williamss own life so frequently that it could be mistaken as pages from his autobiography. The charactersand situations of the play are much like those found in the small St. Louis a positionment where Williams spent part of his life. Williams himself can be seen in the character Tom. two worked in a shoe factory and wrote poetry to escape the depressing reality of their lives, and two eventually ended up leaving. One not so self-evident character is Mr. Wingfield, who is the absent father seen only by the looming picture pause in the Wingfields apartment. Tom and Williams both had fathers who were, as Tom says, in lie with with long distances. Amanda, an overbearing mother who cannot let go of her youth in the Mississippi Delta and her seventeen gentleman callers is much like Williams own mother, Edwina. both(prenominal) Amanda and Edwina were not sensitive to their childrens feelings. In their attempts to push their children to a better future, they pushed them away. The shape for Laura was Williams introverted sister, Rose. According to Contemporary Authors the memory of Rose appears in virtually character, situation, symbol, or moti f in al almost every work afterwards 1938. Edwina, like Amanda, tried to find a gentleman caller for Rose. Both situations ended with a touching confrontation with the caller and an eventual heartbreak Tennessee Williamss brilliant use of symbols adds life to the play. The title itself, The Glass Menagerie, reveals one of the most important symbols. Lauras collection of glass animals represents her fragile state. When Jim, the gentleman caller, breaks the horn withdraw her favorite unicorn, this represents Lauras break from her unique innocence.