A Streetcar Named Desire Fantasy vs Reality Quotes

And look at yourself! Take a look at yourself in that wornout Mardi Gras outfit, rented for fifty cents from some ragpicker! And with the crazy crown on! What queen do you think you are?

– Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire, Scene 10. Stanley launches into Blanche about how silly she looks all dressed up in a soiled evening gown and wearing a tiara on her head, having been drinking steadily for hours. The image she tries to convey of being from rich and attractive royalty does not match the reality. Stanley strips away her illusions one by one.

I’ve been on to you from the start! Not once did you pull any wool over this boy’s eyes! You come in here and sprinkle the place with powder and spray perfume and cover the light bulb with a paper lantern, and lo and behold the place has turned into Egypt and you are the Queen of the Nile! Sitting on your throne and swilling down my liquor! I say – Ha! – Ha! Do you hear me? Ha – ha – ha!

– Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire, Scene 10. Despite his rough and uneducated ways, Stanley proves to be an extremely sharp and clever man. He goes about mentally destroying Blanche, letting her know that he has seen through her lies and theatrics from the very start. In an mocking metaphor he likens her to a deluded Cleopatra, who uses the paper lantern to turn the place into Egypt and hide her real self. Laughing in her face, he accuses her of sitting on her high-class throne and downing his liquor. Stanley is merciless as he tears down Blanche’s illusions about herself.

Operator, operator! Give me long-distance, please… I want to get in touch with Mr. Shep Huntleigh of Dallas. He’s so well-known he doesn’t require any address. Just ask anybody who – Wait! I – No, I couldn’t find it right now… Please understand, I – No! No, wait!… One moment! Someone is – Nothing! Hold on, please!

– Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire, Scene 10. As Blanche’s mental instability increases, she clings more and more to the fantasy that Shep Huntleigh will come to sweep her away from reality and her problems. After Stanley attacks her as a liar and goes to the bathroom she is terrified of what he might do. In a panic she flees to the telephone to call Shep for help, but doesn’t know his number or address.

I don’t know if I did the right thing… I couldn’t believe her story and go on living with Stanley.

– Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire, Scene 11. As Stella packs Blanche’s things for her trip to the mental hospital, she chooses the world of fantasy over reality just like her sister. Blanche has accused Stella’s husband of raping her. But Stella decides to believe her lying husband instead of her sister. She refuses to have her fantasy world with Stanley and their new baby shattered by accepting the Blanche’s word and leaving her violent and predatory husband. Yet she indicates here that she suspects Blanche may be telling the truth. Stella’s dependence on men is shown in this quote.

BLANCHE: Why are you looking at me like that? Is something wrong with me?
EUNICE: You look wonderful, Blanche. Don’t she look wonderful?

– Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire, Scene 11. Blanche is completely out of touch with reality and doesn’t know what is going on. We have dramatic irony here, because the other characters know that Blanche is being sent to a mental institution and she is unaware of this. She also feels that everybody is staring at her and is concerned about her appearance, but Eunice assures her that she looks wonderful.

I can smell the sea air. The rest of my time I’m going to spend on the sea. And when I die, I’m going to die on the sea. You know what I shall die of? [She plucks a grape] I shall die of eating an unwashed grape one day out on the ocean. I will die – with my hand in the hand of some nice-looking ship’s doctor, a very young one with a small blond mustache and a big silver watch. "Poor lady," they’ll say, "the quinine did her no good. That unwashed grape has transported her soul to heaven."

– Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire, Scene 11. After worrying about whether the grapes Eunice offers are washed and cleansed, Blanche goes off on a flight of fancy about dying at sea from eating an unwashed grape. She romanticizing her death by imagining her final moments immersed in love and desire, as a handsome young doctor holds her hand. About to be taken away by the Doctor and Matron to a mental asylum, Blanche has lost touch with reality and her sanity. She is now completely immersed in her fantasy world.

And I’ll be buried at sea sewn up in a clean white sack and dropped overboard – at noon – in the blaze of summer – and into an ocean as blue as my first lover’s eyes!

– Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire, Scene 11. As she descends further into madness and is about to be sent to a mental institution, Blanche romanticizes her own death. In this idealized version of her passing, we see the motif of bathing in the imagery and colors – she speaks of "clean" and "white" and "sea." In a simile she compares the blue of the sea to that of her first lover’s eyes. The passage echoes Blanche’s obsession with washing throughout the play as a need to seek purification of her sins and escape harsh reality.

EUNICE [returning, brightly]: Someone is calling for Blanche.
BLANCHE: It is for me, then!
[She looks fearfully from one to the other and then to the portieres. The "Varsouviana" faintly plays]
Is it the gentleman I was expecting from Dallas?

– Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire, Scene 11. Blanche’s madness and detachment from reality are apparent when Eunice announces that someone is calling. It is the Doctor and Matron who have come to take Blanche to the mental institution. But Blanche believes her old college boyfriend Shep Huntleigh has arrived to rescue her. The polka tune she and her young husband danced to before he shot himself and has haunted Blanche ever since plays faintly.

[She rushes past him into the bedroom. Lurid reflections appear on the walls in odd, sinuous shapes. The "Varsouviana" is filtered into a weird distortion, accompanied by the cries and noises of the jungle. Blanche seizes the back of a chair as if to defend herself.]

– Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire, Scene 11. Blanche’s increasing mental instability is highlighted by the distorted playing of the polka music associated with her husband’s suicide. Her deranged mental state is further suggested by the lurid reflections on the wall and jungle noises, all of which are in Blanche’s troubled mind.

You left nothing here but spilt talcum and old empty perfume bottles – unless it’s the paper lantern you want to take with you. You want the lantern?
[He crosses to dressing table and seizes the paper lantern, tearing it off the light bulb, and extends it toward her. She cries out as if the lantern was herself.]

– Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire, Scene 11. Stanley asserts himself as the dominant male as he tears down Blanche’s symbols of fantasy and illusion. Blanche hides herself behind perfume, talcum powder and the paper lantern she employs to protect herself from reality.

Whoever you are – I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.

– Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire, Scene 11. Blanche depends on strangers to fill the void she has felt in her life ever since her husband committed suicide. She acknowledges this in her final words in the play, spoken to the Doctor. There is a double irony in what she tells him. For sadly the Doctor is not the gallant Shep Huntleigh she was hoping would come to rescue her. Far from being her rescuer, the Doctor is about to take her to a mental asylum. Also the strangers in her life have been kind to her only in exchange for sex, or they have abused and abandoned her. This shows how delusional and detached from reality Blanche is and is now completely immersed in her fantasy world.
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