| Tennessee Williams is one of the greatest American dramatists in the twentieth century.His representative play A Streetcar Named Desire was performed many times after it was premiered in New York in 1947.Thus,Williams has won lots of top theatrical awards,such as the New York Drama Critical Prize,the Pulitzer Prize and the Donaldson Prize.A Streetcar Named Desire is regarded as the best work of Williams therefore.In A Streetcar Named Desire,Williams tells a story of an American middle-aged woman teacher Blanche Dubois who comes from Belle Reve in the south to her younger sister Stella's home in New Orleans.She is raped by her brother-in-law and becomes insane.At last,she is sent to an asylum,leading to her destruction.Scholars at home and abroad analyze the play mainly from the perspective of feminism,symbolism,homosexual aspect and drama techniques,while researches from the perspective of personality structure on this drama is relatively rare.Nowadays,with the development of our society,economy develops fast but people's desires explode with their spiritual world emptier than ever before.It results in a sense of unhappiness because of anxiety and depression.This thesis is written under the guidance of Freud's Personality Structure Theory.The four main characters in the drama are selected to be the objects of the research,namely,Blanche,Stanley,Mitch and Stella.In this way,the thesis tries to reveal the intricate relationship between their social behaviors and personality structures.The thesis consists of three parts: introduction,body and its conclusion.The introduction introduces the author Tennessee Williams,his representative play A Streetcar Named Desire briefly,researches on the play at home and abroad as well as my perspective.The body consists of five chapters:Chapter One introduces Freud's Personality Structure Theory.It gives the explanation of the id,the superego and the ego respectively as well as their relationships.They are in a state of influencing and conflicting with each other.Chapter Two analyzes the heroine Blanche's imbalanced personality.This part points out Blanche's irreconcilable status of her id,ego and superego by introducing Blanche's background as a southern belle,her seeking sexual fulfillment with different men and her desires,which results in her doomed destruction finally.Chapter Three analyzes Stanley's imbalanced personality.He is a typical representative of id.This chapter analyzes reasons accounting for his brutal behaviors done to Blanche,Stella as well as his friends.One reason is his social background,a patriarchal society.Another reason is his too powerful id and his imbalanced personality.Chapter Four analyzes Mitch's imbalanced personality.This part introduces Mitch's Oedipus complex from three perspectives,namely,his mother and father,his interaction with friends at the poker table as well as his work.Then it describes his fragile love for Blanche.Mitch is in a state of imbalanced personality and his superego doesn't develop well.Chapter Five analyzes the character Stella's healthy personality.She is a typical representative of ego.Her ego reconciles her id,her superego with the harsh reality.As a result,she can survive in the new northern environment under the harsh reality because of her healthy personality.The last part is the conclusion.We should face the reality bravely and keeping a healthy personality structure is of great importance to us in the modern society.In all,this thesis attempts to reveal the intricate connection of the personality structure and the social behaviors of the four main characters in the play under the guidance of Freud's Personality Structure Theory and then makes a reasonable explanation for their psychological struggles in their survival efforts in the light of their own personality structures.Their imbalanced personality structures can account for their tragedies of the three main characters in the play.We people should keep a healthy personality structure in order to avoid such tragedies. |
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