Yes, I had many intimacies with strangers. After the death of Allan – intimacies with strangers was all I seemed able to fill my empty heart with… I think it was panic, just panic, that drove me from one to another, hunting for some protection – here and there, in the most – unlikely places – even, at last, in a seventeen-year-old boy but – somebody wrote the superintendent about it – "This woman is morally unfit for her position!"
[She throws back her head with convulsive, sobbing laughter. Then she repeats the statement, gasps, and drinks.]
– Tennessee Williams
A Streetcar Named Desire, Scene 9. In order to feel alive and desired after her husband’s suicide, Blanche admits to sleeping with strangers. She confesses to having sex with a teenage student, which results in her losing her teaching job. Blanche’s deteriorating mental state shows here as stage directions describe her throwing back her head with "convulsive, sobbing laughter" and consuming more alcohol.