Blanche's Insanity in A Streetcar Named Desire

               According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word “insanity” means the “condition of being insane; unsoundness of mind as a consequence of brain-disease; madness, lunacy.” To explore this definition further, the OED states that being insane is, “Not of sound mind, mad, mentally deranged. Also of the mind,” while madness is, “Imprudence, delusion, or (wild) foolishness resembling insanity.” The definitions of lunacy, madness, and insanity mostly credit severe mental illness and impairment as a possible cause of insanity, and while recent psychology studies are able to find several diagnoses and causes for what is considered insane nowadays, these definitions leave out the fact that the view of insanity is seen as what is not normal according to a large community, whether it is a result of mental illness or not. It is common for humans to follow what a community does, and uses a large number of people as a reference for how one should think, act, or feel. In “The Science Behind Why People Follow The Crowd,” by Rob Henderson, he writes, “Following the crowd allows us to function in a complicated environment.” In a country as diverse as the United States of America, and is made even larger by the internet, a person’s view of what is normal, and what is insane is skewed due to the people that they choose to associate themselves with, so insanity is skewed even more, and the divided sides of politics, science, and morals result in one side commonly looking at the other as “insane,” or acting outside of their lifestyle.        

               Blanche from the play A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams is considered insane by both the cultural context and the definitions laid out by the OED. Blanche is a complicated character that is inherently human from the way that Williams develops her grey morals throughout the play, but multiple points in the play display mental instability and her eventual divergence from what is considered normal. Blanche displays instability and not being sound of mind from the start of the play, even before her attack, as a majority of her dialogue comprises of stuttering and Blanche’s stage directions often display her insanity, or what her insanity grows from. The lines, “[Her glance at Blanche is a little anxious],” (Scene One) and “[She laughs nervously…]” (Scene Five), have the words “anxious” and “nervously” which both suggest unpredictability and abnormality. Williams continues to subtly add the fact of Blanche’s insanity through the imagery and symbolism of the grape mentioned in Scene Eleven. “I shall die of eating an unwashed grape one day…” The grape has ties with the Greek god Dionysus, god of madness, but also the grape is a fruit that grows in a bunch, and resembles a society. By being the “unwashed grape” Blanche is removed from the bunch, and therefore removed from the common everyday people. Blanche’s position as the removed person is seen in the large contrast between her and Stanley, and even Stella, who live different lives from the one Blanche wishes to live in, and her clothes, to how she acts, and her way of speaking is detached from the group, making her seem insane to them even before her breakdown.

               One of the most obvious appearances of Blanche’s insanity is the ending of the play and the aftermath of her rape and attack by Stanley. The play ends with her being taken away to an asylum, but her actions and mind are clearly displayed as being mentally ill as a result of traumatic stress, and her madness as a result of this. In one of the stage directions, Williams clearly states that she speaks, “[with faintly hysterical vivacity],” (Scene 11) showing that the events of her attack clearly have an influence on her mental well-being and actions. The word “hysterical” has connotations of instability, and the denotation of hysteria is a psychological disorder that is a result of stress as well. Not only do her actions show her mental illness, but William also plainly states it. Events such as attacks or rapes could lead to traumatic stress which has effects on brain function, structure, memory. Blanche’s reliance on Shep Huntleigh and denial that she still remains a significant figure in his life is another form of proof for her insanity since society sees it as uncommon behavior. “She's got it mixed in her mind with Shep Huntleigh,” (Scene 11). Blanche also displays forgetfulness, “Yes! Yes, I forgot something!” (Scene 11). In the last scene alone, Blanche exhibits several tells that could diagnose her with mental illness and as an extension, insanity. Her severe unsound mind causes her to exhibit actions that lead her to act outside of what is normal.

               In the year 1947 in New Orleans, the setting of the play is seemingly worlds away from California in the present day, but views of insanity and instability have not changed much at all, especially in the American context of how people should act and think. Blanche is not only insane in a diagnostic sense, which is evidently seen in Scene Eleven, where she, “She cries out as if the lantern was herself,” or, “The shadows are of a grotesque and menacing form,” (Scene Ten), that present the oddest behavior in the face of societal normalities, but her inner isolation and opposing way of life with the other characters and of women in the time period turns her into a character that is insane in the face of society. Blanche is a difficult character to grasp, as she constantly lies about her personality and her past as well. It becomes clear that despite her attempts to be seen as innocent, her actions prove that she is the opposite of that. Women of that time were expected to seem pure, and lean toward more traditional values, but Blanche defies those expectations. Not only does she display pedophilia, but also of alcoholic tendencies, since one of the first things that she does once entering Stella’s house is snatch the whiskey bottle. Her actions are severely different from what is expected of her during that time period, and so acts outside of what is common in society, making her seem unnatural and insane. Stella also removes her from that society by saying, “I couldn't believe her story and go on living with Stanley,” (Scene Eleven). Not only does this remove the trauma that Stanley caused to Blanche, taking away the reasoning for her mental state, but shows that Stella went with the crowd in the situation, and isolated Blanche from the “crowd” shown in the play, making her insane by the standards set by society. This makes it seem that her complete abnormality is a fault of her own.

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