In the book, A Streetcar Named Desire, one of the main characters, Blanche, experienced a magnitude of trauma throughout her life. Blanche had to witness multiple deaths from her close loved ones. With that, came heartbreak and extreme pain. Blanche started to cope with the pain in ways that caused her greater pain in the long run. Blanche came to New Orleans with a hope to start over but was shocked to realize she was not going to be safe there. Blanche frequently had random out bursts throughout the book and those around her thought she was mentally ill. They did not understand that Blanche was suffering from multiple traumatic events she had experienced. Towards the end of the book, Blanche was raped by her sisters husband. Blanche was later sent to a mental institution after her sister refused to believe the rape was true. Each event Blanche experienced, left her with permanent pain and suffering to cope with. Tennessee Williams used Blanches character to show the ways of coping with the pain, in unhealthy and healthy ways.
When a person experiences trauma, others may not understand what the side effects might look like. Trauma is “a distressing or life-threatening event” (Psychology Today.) A traumatic event, “is a shocking, scary, or dangerous experience that affects someone emotionally” (National Institute of Mental Health.) Trauma can be anything ranging from a small car accident to a kidnapping and everything in between. Blanche experienced trauma throughout her whole life, this led her to developing PTSD. PTSD is short for “Post traumatic Stress Disorder”. The book gave us a look inside of Blanche’s life and what led her to her breaking point.
Blanche tried to live a double life in New Orleans but Stella and Stanley began to see right through her almost immediately. Stanley was able to see Blanche was not right in the head much quicker than Stella. Blanche walks into the scene one and is described as “daintily dressed in a white suit with a fluffy bodice, necklace and earring of pearl, white gloves and hat” (Williams, 5.) Blanche dresses nice so she can disguise her dark secrets of her past and her desire to look rich. However, we later learn this will never be able to hide her pain or her secrets. Blanche also dresses like that because she wants everyone to think she is young, beautiful and rich. Blanche did that because she is very insecure and rather fragile, she is trying to hide her age and the fact that she is poor. Blanche felt like she needed to be perfect to be loved or liked. This is one of the ways people suffering from traumatic events shield their pain.
Blanche uses other unhealthy ways to cope as well, like, the “inability to make healthy occupational or lifestyle choices,” “escapism,” “alcoholism,” “feeling as though one is permanently damaged,” and “flashbacks” (Cascade Behavioral Health.) All of these symptoms are signs of someone suffering severely from trauma. In the book, Blanche took hot baths all the time. It seems like every other chapter she was taking a hot bath. Stella even knew why Blanche took so many hot bathes, “Shes soaking in a hot tub to quite her nerves” (Williams, 29.) Hot bathes are one of the ways people with anxiety tend to calm down (Calm Clinic, Anxiety Attacks.) Blanche used the baths to run away from her problems and be alone for a few minutes or hours. This goes along with the sign of feeling as though she is permanently damaged from her trauma.
Blanche had many troubling events to make her feel the way she felt. Traumatic events happened all throughout the 30 years of Blanches life. Blanche dealt with the deaths of more family members then most experience in a lifetime. Her sister, Stella moved to New Orleans, leaving Blanche in Belle Reve alone to keep the family afloat. Blanche also lost her husband to suicide when she was only 16, shortly after finding out his troubling secret. Her husband was gay (Williams, 114.) Blanche had the last word to her husband before he died therefor, she blames herself. Her husbands death was one of the biggest contributors to Blanche’s PTSD. Blanche had to go through all of the trauma alone. This led to her learning many of those unhealthy coping skills. After that, Blanche started to look for love in all the wrong places. Blanche would sleep with multiple men to try to find love, including a 17 year old student. In Scene Nine, Blanche finally admits to Mitch, “After the death of Allan intimacies with strangers was all I seemed able to fill my empty heart with…even, at last, in a seventeen-year-old boy” (Williams, 146.) Blanche eventually lost her job because of her intimate relationship with the young boy due to the boy’s father writing to the superintendent (Williams, 146.) Blanche was not able to make healthy occupational or lifestyle choices because she was so driven to replace the pain and sorrow from the trauma.
When Blanche moved to New Orleans she started drinking almost right away. Blanche used the coping mechanism of alcohol. Blanche also lied about how much she drank. In the first scene, she goes to the house and drinks a tumbler of whiskey (Williams, 10.) A few moments later, she is with Stella and drinks another glass of whiskey, then tells Stella, “One is my limit” (Williams, 14.) Blanche is using the alcohol to mask her pain all throughout the book. Towards the end of the book, she is offering Mitch a drink and he tells her to stop drinking Stanley’s liquor (Williams, 142.) Blanche then gets angry at Mitch after he accused her of, “lapping it up all summer like a wild cat” (Williams, 143.) She refused to admit to the accusations and stopped the conversation after that. Alcoholism is one of the most common ways to avoid the pain and suffering from Trauma. Blanche uses the alcohol to suppress her traumatic past.
Blanche also makes up stories of different realities throughout the book. Blanche tells Stanley, “I received a telegram from an old admirer of mine” (Williams, 152.) She goes on to explain how she is going on an exotic Caribbean cruise with Mr. Step Huntleigh, knowing it is all a lie (Williams, 153.) She used ideas of different realities to remove herself from the life she was currently living. Blanche used the coping mechanism of Escapism. Escapism is defined roughly as, “the tendency to seek distraction and relief from unpleasant realities” (Anxiety, Panic & Health.) This sense of different realities is actually one of the less common self effects of trauma. It is also not always a negative side effect, when done properly, it can simply be known as daydreaming. In Blanches situation, she is using it to escape from the fact she feels unsafe everywhere and it starts to hurt her more than help. Blanche’s lying led to Stanley and Stella not trusting her and believing she was truly mentally ill. The biggest example of how Blanche’s lies hurt her was when Stella did not believe Stanley raped her sister. Stella sent Blanche away to never return because she just could not believe her (Williams, 164.) Williams does a great job at portraying Blanche’s alternate realities and how her lying is not helping people trust her.
Blanche also had horrible flashbacks throughout the whole book. We do not find out until the end that the Varsouviana music in each scene is really from Blanche’s head. Blanche had flashbacks often and they always ended abruptly right after her husband pulls the trigger. Flashbacks are one of the most common side effects of PTSD. Flashbacks are a feelings as though you are “being drawn back into the traumatic experience, all over again” (Trauma Recovery.) Blanche also had triggers that encouraged the flashbacks to begin. If her husband was mentioned or Belle Reve was brought up, she would always fall into a flashback. You can always tell when Blanche had a flashback, because she always had to sit down and became very upset. Those who suffer from PTSD are much more likely to experience frequent flashbacks. This is what Blanche suffered through.
Traumatic events can influence anyones life choices whether it is in a positive or negative way. Healthy coping skills are incredibly important and in Blanches life, it could have made a major difference to her story. The book does a wonderful job at showing how much her past events had an influence in life. Trauma is not something easily defined, and it comes with a lot of side effects, including PTSD. Tennessee Williams used A Streetcar Named Desire to show just how hurt and damaged a person can get when suffering from trauma.