Exploring Amanda of The Glass Menagerie Essay - 2035 Words

Exploring Amanda of The Glass Menagerie Tennessee Williams has a gift for character. Not many playwrights do, and even fewer possess the unique ability to craft a character as paradoxical and complex as Amanda Wingfield. In The Glass Menagerie, Amanda is a very difficult character to understand because of her psychological disposition. Williams realizes this and provides the reader with a character description in hopes of making the character more accessible to meticulous analysis. AMANDA WINGFIELD the mother. A little woman of great but confused vitality clinging frantically to another time and place. Her characterization must be carefully created, not copied from type. She is not paranoiac, but her life is†¦show more content†¦Even when the reader is shown only small glimpses of Amanda’s personality, he or she should still be able to flesh out her motives through this initial knowledge of her natural state of mind. The complexity of Amandas character directly affects her action and dialogue with her children. In her role as mother she exhibits an overwhelming desire to see her children succeed in life. In trying to push them toward her ideal of success, she at times unwittingly hurts them even though she means well. Her actions often hide her intense love for her children, but it is an important driving force in her motivations. She loves them too well--at times to a point of smothering them (perhaps the reason for the departure of her husband)--which results in her attempt to push them towards all the good things she has known and remembered and away from anything that does not suit her ideal. As Amanda calls Tom to the table in Scene I and comments on manners and habits, we have our first glimpse of Amanda, the mother. She corrects actions much as mothers have done throughout time in accordance with her own sense of importance. Animals have sections in their stomachs which enable them to digest food without mastication, but human beings are supposed to chew their food before they swallow it down. Eat food leisurely, son, and really enjoy it. A well-cooked meal has lots of delicate flavors thatShow MoreRelatedEssay on The Glass Menagerie: An Analysis1556 Words   |  7 Pageson the Wingfield family, the story consisted of five characters: Amanda Wingfield (the mother), Laura Wingfield (the daughter), Tom Wingfield (son, narrator, Laura’s older brother), Jim Connor (Tom and Laura’s old acquaintance from high school) and Mr. Wingfield (father to Tom and Laura, and Amanda’s husband)- who abandoned the family long before the start of the play. The title, â€Å"The Glass Menagerie†, represented a collection of glass animals on display in the Wingfields’ home. At one point or anotherRead MoreTennessee Williams: His Life in quot;Suddenly Last Summerquot; and quot;The Glass Menage riequot;2784 Words   |  12 PagesIn the study of Tennessee Willliams plays: Suddenly Last Summer and The Glass Menagerie, we can find a great deal of autobiographical connections. The Glass Menagerie is particularly considered the authors most biographical work. It is described by the playwright as a memory play; indeed, it is a memory of the authors own youth, an expression of his own life and experiences. Similarly, Suddenly Last Summer includes many of Tennesse Williams real life details. First and foremost,Read MoreHow Does Williams Explore the Theme of Entrapment in the Glass Menagerie?1698 Words   |  7 PagesThis links into the symbolism of the broken glass unicorn in Scene 7, in which Jim attempts to free Laura from her shyness and peculiarity; however, in the end, Jim shatters Laura emotionally, breaking off the horn of the unicorn. Relating back to the era of depression and the idea of ‘escapism’, Tom, as Williams’ protagonist, explores the concept of escape in various forms, such as books, the cinema and his own poetry. For example, in Scene 3, Amanda takes away Tom’s book by D. H. Lawrence, who