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The Glass Menagerie Cd

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Amanda Wingfield always tells her daughter, Laura, she should look nice and pretty for gentleman callers, even though Laura has never had any callers at their St. Louis apartment. Laura, who limps because of a slight physical deformity, would rather spend her time playing with the animals in her glass menagerie and listening to old phonograph records instead of learning shorthand and typing so she can be employable. When she learns Laura has only been pretending to go to secretarial school, Amanda decides Laura must have a real gentleman caller and insists her son Tom, who works at a shoe factory, find one immediately. After a few days, Tom tells Amanda he has invited a young man named Jim O'Connor home for dinner.

The night of the dinner Amanda takes charge personally to make sure Laura looks more attractive. However when Laura realizes that the Jim O'Connor who is visiting is possibly the same Jim on whom she had a crush in high school, she does not want to go through with the dinner. Although she has to be excused from the dinner because she has made herself physically ill, Laura is able to impress Jim with her quiet charm when the two of them keep company in the living room and she finally loses some of her shyness. When Jim gives Laura her first kiss, it looks as if Amanda's plans for Laura's happiness might actually come true.

THE GLASS MENAGERIE is the first big success in the long and storied career of playwright Tennessee Williams. This "memory" play tells of a family trapped in destructive patterns. After being abandoned by her husband, Amanda Wingfield has become trapped between worlds of illusion and reality. She says she wants what is best for her children, but seems incapable of acknowledging what that would be or actually providing it for them. Tom, tired of only watching adventure at the movies, is determined to break away from his dominating mother, but stays only for the sake of his sister. Laura may not be the dominating belle of the ball her mothers wants, but she has her own inner charm and when confronted with Jim, a visitor from the normal world, there is the chance that she will finally claim her life as her own. A poignant drama on the importance of love.

This drama of the Wingfield family is one of the twentieth century's great American plays, and it is no surprise that it is still taught throughout the country as an example of fine theater. The characters are psychologically true for their 1930's setting, and they reveal themselves brilliantly through their dialogue. The story is simple, the symbolism is obvious and readily understandable, the claustrophobic and depressing atmosphere is heightened by the fact that all the action takes place in a small apartment, and the line between reality and dream world, while clear to the audience, is tragically unclear to the players on stage.

Though the play may be structurally and aesthetically satisfying to an older audience familiar with this period, it may be less successful, after sixty years, to a contemporary audience. Amanda is so meddlesome that her good heart, her dreams for her family, and her control over Tom are unrealistic by today's standards. Tom, with his sense of obligation toward the family, sometimes appears personally weak. Most difficult, however, is Laura, so pathologically shy and introverted that she is happy to stay indoors all day, polishing her glass animals and remaining completely dependent on her brother and mother to support and protect her.

This has always been one of my favorite plays, but reading or watching it now feels a bit like watching a costume drama. Though it is brilliantly written, its characters and dramatic situations are so different from our twenty-first century lives, that the play and characters really come alive only when analyzed in conjunction with the social context in which they were originally presented. For a modern audience, Laura may be more pathetic than tragic. Mary Whipple

This timeless play has been studies and performed around the world since 1945. Tennessee Williams', "The Glass Menagerie" has been classified as legendary for decades and will continue to appear in classrooms and theaters for decades to come. This play is still so popular today because it can still be related to today. It has effective description, realistic characters, and modern language so it is easily understood.
This play seems ageless although it was written over a half of a century ago. There are several similarities with today's society. In the play, tom, the narrator and main character is less than satisfied with his life. He works as a shoemaker but has big dreams for himself. He complains about his job and life when he says, "Listen! You think I'm crazy about the warehouse? You think I'm in love with the Continental Shoemakers? You think I want with-fluorescent-tubes! Look! I'd rather somebody picked up a crowbar and battered out my brains-than go back mornings"(page 23). Tom wants to be a poet and experience adventure. We can all relate to this. At times we are not satisfied with life and it's good to dream a little and have goals for yourself.
Another good aspect of this play is how realistic the characters are. The main characters Tom, Amanda, and Laura don't lead a perfect life. They all have weaknesses. Tom hates his job; Amanda has problems raising and supporting Laura and Tom; Laura has a physical disability. The family goes through real life situations and problems.
The description and overall narration of the play is a key role in its effectiveness. The characters and plot are described so you can get a picture in your mind of the people and the apartment they lie in. The narrator being a character helped a lot with getting a visual of things. This description of the Wingfield's apartment is an example of the detailed description in the play. "The Wingfield apartment is in the rear of the building, one of those vast hive-like conglomerations of cellular living-units that flower as warty growths in overcrowded urban centers of lower middle-class population and are symptomatic of the impulse of this largest and fundamentally enslaved section of American society to avoid fluidity and differentiation and to exist and function as one interfused mass of automatism"(page 3).
Sometimes when reading plays it can be difficult to fully grasp a good sense of the plot. However, it is not the case in "The Glass Menagerie". The plot is fully developed through the characters actions and dialogues. Also, the vivid description Tom gives is very helpful. It is easy to understand because Tom comes right out and tells you what to expect like when he tells us, "I am the narrator of the play, and also a character in it. The other characters are my mother, Amanda, my sister, Laura, and a gentleman caller who appears in the final scenes"(page 5).
Not only is this a well written play, but also it is an easy read. It uses everyday language. It's not difficult to comprehend as it uses modern speaking and dialogues. It's a short play that will grasp you attention and be over before you know it. "The Glass Menagerie" is so popular for a reason. It's a classic play that will be studied and referenced for years to come. It's amazing how a play written so long ago is not obsolete and still relates to today's society.

The Glass Menagerie, by Tennessee Williams has many things I found you can relate to your own life. Even if you don't have an annoying mother crippled sister or lives in St. Louis. There are three main characters. Amanda, Laura and Tom and they all have problems that they are trying to escape. I first found their problems made the book more realistic but as the book progressed they were, at times, nearly oblivious to reality.
Williams also uses some symbolism, which emphasizes the themes. The music played at the end of each scene and at random times show drama. The blue rose symbolizes Laura's uniqueness, and it represents her appeal to Jim, a guy form high school. The fire escape symbolizes the characters trying to escape from their lives. I like when writers use symbolism especially with a short book because you can pick up on the meanings and the point of the book better. The plot was simple, yet very effective. A reason for the simplicity I think is that this book is meant for us to realize that even though things may have been better in the past you shouldn't dwell on them or you may be missing something better that is right in front of you.
Getting enthralled in what has happened in the past and staying in the past had happened to too many people in their lives. I think Williams brought this to our attention in a good way. The novel is a fast paced book and it kept me wondering what was going to happen next. I didn't like the fact that it was set up as a play though. I don't like reading plays but if you do I recommend this novel.

The Glass Menagerie, by Tennesse Williams is a tale of desperation and a longing for something more. The characters within this incredible stories pages yearn for more than the mundane facts of life. Amanda, who plays the mother, grew up a pure southern belle. As she describes it, men practically kissed the ground she walked on. Wouldn't you think her daughter Laura would be the same? The answers no. Laura is a shy, crippled girl who is forced to wear braces on her legs. Unlike her mother, Laura rarely has gentlman callers and this bothers Amanda. Her mother, not knowing what to do with Laura, signs her up for business classes which Laura secretly skips. Her brother Tom is an aspiring poet who is forced to work in a shoe warehouse so he can support his family. Their father ran out on them at an early age and the only thing they have recieved from him in years is a single postcard.
The Glass Menagerie is one of the few books that has ever caught me by surprise. You can't help but feel the agony of repression these three main characters feel. The novel, which was originally written for the stage, only takes place over a very short period of time in late 1930's. It was a time of change and growth of the human spirit. The beliefs of youth and age clashed and no matter who you were you longed for something different. But as our character Tom figures out at the end, change isn't always what you need.
I feel the most interesting quality this novel contained was it's use of symbolism. The fire escape had so much meaning behind it, it was practically impossible to miss. It was their only way of escaping the pain that was inside the walls of their home. The music that was often cued in the play took a major part in creating the essense behind the story. Music relates to memory and that is what this play comes down to, memories of how it should be, or should I say, the delusions the Wingfield family created.
Overall this book impressed me. It had all the elements a good story should have,(pain, pleasure, humor, distruction and healing). I would recommend this book to anyone who is looking to sit down and sink into a well written story. After all, everyone lives within their own glass menagerie.

I read the play The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams. I really enjoyed reading this book because it was easy to follow, and it was very interesting. The book is about a dysfunctional family who lives in St. Louis during the Great Depression. The play has three main characters. Tom is the narrator and the oldest son. Tom has been out of high school for six years and works at Continental Shoemakers Warehouse. He supports the entire family. He has a bad habit of smoking, which his mother, Amanda, does not like. Amanda is a mother who has high expectations for her children. She emphasizes all the wrong things Tom does, which frustrates him to a degree where he leaves and does not come home until late at night. The last main character is Laura. She is quiet and does not like going out in public.She usually gets stuck in the middle of the arguments between Tom and Amanda.
I like this book because Tennessee Williams relates incidents to how things actually were during the 1930's. For example during the play, Laura is supposed to be taken tests to see if she is eligible to get a job, but she skips them. Amanda's resolution for Laura is for her to get married. Back in the 1930's, if women could not make it on their own by working, they got married to a man who could support them. Another example would be Amanda does not have a job. Tom has to support his mother and his sister. This shows how people survived during the depression.
I also liked how Mr. Williams conveyed each character in the family with problem of some kind. Tom is bored of his life and wants to go out and have adventure. That is why he goes out to the movies every night. Laura is extremely shy and never leaves the house. She has a collection of glass ornaments that she organizes and keeps with her at all times. Amanda is an over protective mother that will not let Tom go. He is six years out of high school and she still tries to control what he does, and that leads to many arguments between the two of them.
The last main aspect I like about this play was how Tennessee Williams made each character have something special of their own to escape the hardships of life. Laura's glass menagerie of animals helped her escape reality. Those glass animals are all she cared about. Tom, on the other hand, escaped reality by going to the movies. He would go out late into the night and watch movies of people having adventurous lives, just as he dreamt about. Lastly, Amanda's escape from reality was Blue Mountain. She would ponder on the old times when she was popular and was loved by everyone.

The Glass Menagerie, by Tennessee Williams, is truely a book you can't put down. Each charachter is so different from another, and somehow you connect with each one, whether you like their actions or not. Amanda, the mother, and your two kids, Tom and Laura, live a depressing life starting from when their father left years ago.
I for one, really enjoyed reading this book. I liked that it was in play format, making it an extremly easy read, not to mention it was not very long. I found myself finishing the play in one day because I couldn't put it down, I always wanted to know what was going to happen next. My favorite character was the mother. I thought she was a riot because of how she was always on her kids for something, whether it was Tom, and how he was always out late at the movies; or Laura, and how she never had gentleman callers. Although, she did annoy me at times when she would speak of old memories when her gentleman callers would be lined up for her each week. She reminded me of someone that did not have a lot of money, but loved pretending like she lived some other life to show the gentleman callers how good the family had it. I also like Tom's character a lot. I thought it was really easy for people to relate to him. He was an average man working at a shoe warehouse to support his mother and sister. I really connected with Tom because I could feel for how truely frustrated with his life he was. I felt bad for the numbing routine of his job, and then coming home to his nagging mother. Although I do not agree with how he choose to deal with it(movies and excessive drinking), that is how he escaped the reality of his life. The only thing I did not really like about this book was Laura. I think is was because we are such different people. It annoyed me how shy she was, and quick to give up on things because she was nervous. I felt that if I was actually in a room with her, her nervousness would just fill the room immeadiatly and I would become uncomfortable. Her whole presence just annoyed me. I didn't like the fact that she gave up on her schooling, and pretended as if she was still going. It bothered me that she was okay not doing anything with her life. All that mattered to her was her "glass menagerie".
After many of countless nights of Amanda begging for a gentleman caller, Tom finally brought one home for Laura. Ironically, it was Laura's highschool crush, Jim O'Connor. She was so nervous, she couldn't even open the door until forced to by Amanda. She was so sick to her stomach that she didn't even show up to dinner, which again annoyed me. When Amanda was cleaning the kitchen, Jim went for Laura. The two of them talked, danced and even kissed. Jim really got to Laura and opened her up. At this point I was really happy, because for the first time I wasn't annoyed by Laura, but I was thrilled for her. By the way things were going, I thought Laura was going to find someone. That is until Jim apologized for the kiss and explained to her that he was in a serious relationship, and actually engaged. I was really sympathetic towards Laura now, and I felt bad that her heart was broken by Jim. I thought the ending of the play was good. The only thing that bothered my is that I didn't get to see what happened to the characters. I was left wanting to know more, like if Laura ever got married, or if Tom ever found a job that would make him happy.

The Glass Menagerie is a gripping tale of three family members trying to make it through life. Amanda, the mother of the family, is a caring mother that, in her days of youth, had men adoring her much of the time. However, much to Amanda's dismay, her daughter Laura is not so great with the guys. She has a disease, called pleurosis, that leaves her in leg braces. Her brother Tom is an aspiring poet, but works in a shoe warehouse to support his mother and sister. He doesn't like his job and hates that he has to support everyone.
I think that The Glass Menagerie was a wonderful book which took you in and let you get to know the characters. You feel like you are very close to them. Laura is an intersting character that I felt for. It is sad that she is stuck in leg braces. Also when Tom's friend Jim joins the family for dinner, she at first is very shy. Then she talks to him and enjoys his warm comfort. She ends up dancing with him and he actually kisses her. At this point in the story you feel a connection between the two. I felt very happy for Laura that she could finally get over her shyness and get to really know someone. He even tells her a nickname he thought up for her in highschool, "Blue Rose". I felt like Laura finally found the person for her. While they are dancing Jim accidentally knocks over a glass unicorn that was Laura's favorite. She is forgiving and explains that now the unicorn is a normal horse. This symbolizes that Laura was different from other girls because of her disease, but Jim made her feel like "a normal horse". This means she felt like a normal girl and that made her feel great. They finally kiss and Jim apologizes. He goes on to explain that he is in a serious relationship and he can't be doing this. Laura's heart is broken, but she gives him the broken glass unicorn as a souvenir. Jim then tells the family that he has to leave because he is meeting his fiancée. When Jim leaves Amanda is very upset with Tom for bringing Jim over when he was engaged. Tom explains that he didn't know that. Then, Amanda goes to Laura and comforts her. At this point in the story your heart goes out to Laura. She finally met someone she liked being with and could talk to and have fun with, and he has a fiancée. The story ends with Tom talking about how he can never forget what he did to Laura, and no matter where he goes he is always reminded of the incident. At this point in the story, at the end, I did not feel content with the way it ended. I was left longing for Laura to find a man for her and wondering what would happen to Tom. I guess I'll never know.

Quite simply, The Glass Menagerie is the very reason you read a book. For the passion, the pain, the happiness, that indescribable feeling you get when you've finished the very last sentence. Tennessee Williams doesn't disappoint. The Glass Menagerie tells the story a family trapped in the ruthless battle of life, struggling to survive their circumstances and the memories that plague the Wingfield apartment. So subtlety and tenderly does Williams weave the reader within the words of his play that we too are left like his characters, gasping for a breath away from the intoxicating despair that inhabits their existence. The Glass Menagerie's brilliance lies in Tom as narrator, Williams continues symbols (eg. the Paradise Dance Hall, the gentlemen caller, the fir escape) and his ability to create characters so real you can almost hear their heart beat. Basically if you haven't read The Glass Menagerie you should, it's an unforgettable experience.

THE GLASS MANAGERIE, written in 1944, is a painfully poignant drama about a crippled girl, Laura Wingfield, who is so shy and insecure that she spends her days in her mother's house, playing old phonograph records left by her father, who deserted the family long ago, and caring for her collection of glass figurines ("the glass managerie"). Laura's mother, Amanda, is an old-fashioned "southern belle," charming but emotionally weak; though she finds fault with Laura and her shyness, Amanda lives in her own world of illusions. She dreams of a business career for Laura; when this fails, she dreams that Laura will find a handsome "gentleman" to marry. Aside from the "gentleman caller," the other character in the play is Laura's brother, Tom, who also dreams - of being an artist, another "Shakespeare." Tom is both a character in the drama and its narrator; in this way, THE GLASS MANAGERIE is a "memory play": its action is RECOUNTED by a narrator, Tom.
The similarities between this play and both A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE and Arthur Miller's DEATH OF A SALESMAN are striking. All three of these works deal with the contrast between illusion - dreams -and reality. In STREETCAR, Blanche du Bois is a delicate, refined "southern belle," who prefers to live in a dream-world; in this way she is like both Laura and Amanda Wingfield. But I find the parallels with SALESMAN even more interesting. These begin with the opening stage directions, which describe the set of the Wingfield's house as having transparent walls (so that Tom can narrate, then walk through the walls into "the past" to become a character in the play) and as being located in an overcrowded section of town. In SALESMAN, the Lomans' home has transparent walls for the very same purpose - so that the characters can exist both in the present and in the past - and is at the same time shown to be "boxed in" with many other houses, showing the desperation and helplessness of the family's situation. Like Willy Loman, Amanda has great but unrealistic hopes for her children. And like Biff Loman, Tom Wingfield is bored with his menial job and dreams of being free to create and to go where he likes. Jim, the gentleman caller, also resembles Biff in that he was a success in high school but now, six years later, is only a shipping clerk - yet he believes in the myth that a winning personality will eventually make him a success. That MANAGERIE and the later SALESMAN resemble each other in so many respects means that Miller must have admired and learned from Williams. Indeed, the twentieth century was extremely fortunate to have had these two great dramatists writing practically simultaneously. THE GLASS MANAGERIE is certainly one of the jewels from that golden age -- the 1910's to the 1950's -- of American drama.