The Bond of Motherly Love

This paper intends to determine the intuitive behavior of Characters and justify their seemingly amoral actions in a famous American play The Glass Menagerie, written in the background of Great depression. The study of character’s behavior includes nostalgia, nervousness, frustration and desire of escape. The play is based on a father absent family, consists of mother and two young children. Mother’s name is Amanda whose mind is adorned with American Dream, she craves to secure the future of her family during the traumatic situation of the great depression, compels her daughter to study in business school and hampers Tom to relish the joys of music, liquor and movies lest he may lose his job. There is a deep psychological study ofall the main characters especially Laura, a young crippled girl, always afraid of the world outside and remain absorbed in the glass Menagerie. Moreover, there is an objective to spot the influence of American Dream on the American society of 1930s and it will be compared to the contemporary American Dream. In these days Americans’ prospect of attaining opportunity of well-to-do life has become a dream as the very word “American Dream” itself indicates the denial of reality and if it still exists than it is not for all.

Memory is the diary that we all carry about with us. "-Oscar Wilde Matthew Arnold once suggested that, " the pursuit of perfection is a pursuit of sweetness and light. " In many ways this is exactly what the characters of The Glass Menagerie seek in the play – perfection. They look for it in their future, as they search for a way to find security and hope. Although they find glimmers of hope throughout the story, each time is it extinguished like the candles at the end of the play. The Oxford English Dictionary states memory as, " to commemorate; to preserve a record or memorial of; to record, mention, " But even though Tom is recollects " that quaint period, the thirties " to commemorate his family and their tragic existence, he does so with the " appearance of truth " and " illusions " that proves how fragile and deceitful memory can be. All the characters are unable to accept and relate to this reality. As a result each of them withdraws into a private world of illusion where they find the comfort and meaning that the real world fails to offer.

Escapism is a part of psychology which in this research connected into literature as an interdisciplinary study which shows inclination of human personality to seeking for a way out or escape from unpleasant realities. The aim of the research was to describe the characters got acquainted with escapism and the way the characters' cope with escapism in their daily life. The research employed a descriptive qualitative method with psychoanalytical approach of Sigmund Freud's personality structure from anxiety theory, defense and problem solving mechanism. Data sources were primary and supporting data. The primary data were taken from Tennessee William's The Glass Menagerie, and supporting data were taken from the books, journals, articles, and internet sources. The research indicated that each character experienced anxiety that made them got acquainted with escapism. They had their own way in dealing with escapism through defense and problem solving mechanism. Some characters solved emotional problems with negative mechanism consciously or unconsciously, and others handled emotion with positive mechanism, therefore the result were also positive.

The Glass Menagerie is one of the Tennessee Williams' most famous plays which won the New York Drama Critics' Circle award. It elevated him to be one of the greatest playwrights of his generation. As a playwright, he is skilful to make the readers conscious of the unconscious habits and attitudes in everyday life. In The Glass Menagerie, Tennessee Williams (1911-1983) portrayed family relationships and struggles against hopelessness that threatens their lives. The present study made a discourse analysis of Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie. This discourse analysis of the dialogic language was based on dialogic principles outlined by Weigand (2009). The researchers applied these principles to uncover conventional and unconventional elements embedded in the structures of the language. The study also analyzed the discourse contexts and their impact on the meaning of the given different situations that the main characters, i.e., Amanda, Laura, Tom Wingfield, encounter during the ongoing actions of the play. This research, furthermore, presented insights on how Tennessee Williams achieved the intended dramatic effect in the discourse of the characters. The introductory part of the research paper presented the features of a dramatic discourse in relation to language of The Glass Menagerie. A review of literature related to the play gives a summary of the literary and linguistic research carried out by different researchers to understand the play from various aspects. A detailed linguistic analysis unravels the functional aspects of dialogic discourse that are embedded in the lines of the text. The findings unfold the logics concealed in the dialogues and kind of structures used for dramatic effect.

Tennessee William is the most exceptional American playwright. The purpose of this research paper is to critically evaluate the two plays of Tennessee William: " Glass Menagerie " and " A Streetcar named Desire ". Mostly his plays revolve around female characters. Despite this, there are also other important elements in his plays such as symbolism, reality, expressionism, abjection, identity, victimization of women, rape, conflict between society and individual, love and death, madness, sexuality, political dissent, Homosexuality, Homophobia and tragic tradition. We have selected only above two plays for our critical analysis. The core characters in these two plays are women. Our analysis includes themes like interrelationship of past and present, the conflict between illusion and reality and the last one is gender and the issue of sexuality. The problem of protagonists to face the reality and to accept the sexuality all are inter-linked and initiated from the Past. The women in the plays of Tennessee William are seen in the perspective of past tradition in relation to the Southern culture. The study of these plays concludes that the two major characters of females as a heroine are the " same person " while their roles are different at different stages of life.

International Journal of Applied Linguistics & English Literature, 2013