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A Streetcar Named Desire

by Tennessee Williams, Arthur Miller (Introduction)

3.90 · rating details · 35,612 ratings · 687 reviews

It is a very short list of 20th-century American plays that continueto have the same power and impact as when they first appeared 57 yearsafter its Broadway premiere, Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desireis one of those plays. The story famously recounts how the faded andpromiscuous Blanche DuBois is pushed over the edge by her sexy andbrutal brother-in-law, Stanley...more

Paperback, 224 pages

Published September 1st 2004 by New Directions Publishing Corporation (first published January 1st 1947)

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Aug 13, 2008

Becky rated it

· review of another edition

Recommended to Becky by: Leslie

Shelves: reviewed, 2008

I enjoyed the story... It really drew me in, which is saying something considering that I picked it to read on commercial breaks during the Olympics... and I ended up reading instead of watching.

I liked this play because the characters seemed like real, flawed people. Granted, Blanche was a little over-the-top sometimes, but I imagine all southern-belle types are a little over-the-top from time to time.

Blanche was an easily identifiable character... someone who deeply r...more

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Apr 01, 2008

Selena rated it

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Shelves: plays-modern

Not a fan, though, I should preface that by saying that I'm not really a fan of Tenessee Williams in general (what kind of name is that anyway? Who names their kid after a state?). I don't share his fascination with abusive relationships, nor do I find the tragic romance in them that he does (call me a prude, but I am offended at the idea that anyone could find redeeming romantic qualities in an abusive relationship, especially a male writer).

I find nothing redeeming in the character...more

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Jun 02, 2010

Jody rated it

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I love Tennessee Williams and this is why. I had never read a play with such passion and lyricism (except for Shakespeare). I had read Death of a Salesman (of course, fantastic, but dry, like a worn book), Our Town (I wanted to fall out of my desk from sheer boredom), and Desire Under the Elms (I wanted to hang myself from the ridiculousness of this horrible play. Even seeing gorgeous Sophia Loren could not pull my opinion out of the mud) and they did nothing for my bad sixteen year old self. T...more

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Aug 10, 2007

Sara rated it

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Shelves: drama

This play offers such humanity and vulnerability in all of his characters. There is the faint echo of the deep south, the strained and potent relationship between Blanche and Stanley, her brother in law, the tension between the expecting Stella and her husband due to her sister's presence and Blanche's haunting vulnerability and madness creating a powerful vacuum that really sucked me in and held me there. I would hate for this wonderfully crafted play to just become an "masterpiece"; ...more

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Feb 07, 2012

Andrew Maxwell rated it

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A streetcar named desire was a very dramatic and a good book to read. This book demonstrates mental and emotional problems that still happen today. The three main characters Stanley, Stella, and Blanche all go through emotional issues with eachother. The theme of sex/desire leads to destruction is expressed many times throughout this book. Blanche the main character symbolizes an insane woman throughout her life. Many obstacles through her life and stages where she has had mental breakdowns.
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Feb 06, 2012

Ocean Wong rated it

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Well 1st off i was surprised at a Streetcar Named Desire cause i wasn't expecting much. Since we had to read it for school i thought it was going to be another lame book but oh boy how wrong i was! Well to start off the story is about Blanche and how she is trampled upon her cruel brother in law. But its not just a simple story of how her brother in law is mean to her. But instead Mr Williams shows how Stanley(her brother in law) tramples her and the results of doing it and explores other things...more

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Dec 26, 2011

David Sarkies rated it

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Recommended to David by: My English Teacher

Shelves: modernist

Sometimes I wonder why it is that English teachers insist on forcing us to read such painful rubbish? Is it because they want to see how many of their students commit intellectual suicide, or simply is it a means of inflicting pain upon them so that at end of the year they can emerge much stronger and more capable. I know this sounds a little extreme, but then again this play is also quite extreme in an of itself.
The first question that I ask about this play is 'what is the point?' In mos...more Sometimes I wonder why it is that English teachers insist on forcing us to read such painful rubbish? Is it because they want to see how many of their students commit intellectual suicide, or simply is it a means of inflicting pain upon them so that at end of the year they can emerge much stronger and more capable. I know this sounds a little extreme, but then again this play is also quite extreme in an of itself.
The first question that I ask about this play is 'what is the point?' In most books that I read there is a point. There is movement from beginning to the end, towards some definite point in the future where everything has been revealed and everything becomes clear. Further, there is also a aspect of learning and growing as one reads what I consider to be good literature. To be blatantly honest, there is none if this at all in this play (and I believe that this is a character trademark of William's plays).
I guess if one sits down at tries to look at this play objectively, analysing the characters, one could argue that it is tearing off the glazed covering of American Society and looking at the social decay within. Now, this play was written in post-war America, at the height of its society, and it is a time when many of the older generation would look back with fondness and a desire to return to the good old days. In a sense, this plays suggests that these days were not necessarily good.
However, before I go down that road, let us consider the so called plot of this play. Blanche Dubois arrives in New Orleans to move in with her sister in an attempt to get her life back on track. However, we quickly come to realise that Blanche has quite a few screws lose, and is living in some fantasy world were a gentleman caller (another name for a suitor) will appear out of thin air and carry her away to a place of happiness. However, her sister's household is not all that wonderful, being married to a brute of a husband. The play then drifts back and forth, going pretty much nowhere, until the end where Blanche is escorted to a mental hospital, saying the famous lines about the kindness of strangers.
There you go, that is pretty much it. Stan goes on being a prick, and Stella goes on letting him be one. Some have queried why Stella would put up with somebody like Stan, however this is post-war America, and couples simply did not walk out on each other (unlike today, in the land of the pre-nup). Even then, people still insist on living in abusive relationships (and it is usually the man being the abuser and the woman the abuse, though I would argue that it is not necessarily always the case, but I will not dwell too much on this here, particularly with aspects of the nanny state intruding on so-called abusive relationships, though one comment that I should make is that a husband to steps in to stop his wife from wasting money on unnecessary expenditures is not necessarily being abusive) even today. There have been lots of studies on this phenomena, one being that there is a belief that one day they will change, the fear of being alone, or simply bring oneself into a state of co-dependence. However, if we drift back to the days of A Streetcar Named Desire, there is also the social stigma attached to divorces and single mothers, particularly since society was still incredibly sexist in that they were unable to see fault in the husband in such an unsuccessful relationship.
Maybe Tennessee Williams was trying to make this point in his play, namely that society is rotten and decayed, and that we, like Blanche Dubois, live in a fantasy world were everything works well, and that we shut our minds to the possibility of abuse. Many of us still do this today, and it is not necessarily propoganda that is being pumped into us from above to keep us blinded and deceived, but we also do it to ourselves for fear of actually being confronted with a truth that has the possibility of shattering our worldview (or even forcing us to acknowledge that we, ourselves, are the instigators of this corruption).(less)

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Sep 08, 2011

Claudia rated it

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A Streetcar Named Desire is the most polished and certainly the most intense play of the three Tennessee Williams plays I read. It treats another disturbed family, this time in New Orleans, in a small apartment. Although I loved reading it for its intensity, I am positive that, as with The Night of the Iguana, there is a lot I have missed. This is play that I need to revisit to fully appreciate. I think it’d be all the more powerful to watch it live, or at least one of these days I’ll watch the ...moreA Streetcar Named Desire is the most polished and certainly the most intense play of the three Tennessee Williams plays I read. It treats another disturbed family, this time in New Orleans, in a small apartment. Although I loved reading it for its intensity, I am positive that, as with The Night of the Iguana, there is a lot I have missed. This is play that I need to revisit to fully appreciate. I think it’d be all the more powerful to watch it live, or at least one of these days I’ll watch the Marlon Brando movie. There is so much underneath the surface of the words, underneath the surface of the characters. One read of the play has barely introduced them to me. (Although I should add that in some cases, I’m not sure how much more I want to know about the characters!)
In the play, Stella and her husband Stanley are visited by Stella’s sister Blanche, who at first appears to be an outgoing and impressive personality. As the play progresses, it becomes clear that Blanche is distressed at the dismantling of the life she’s dreamed up for herself; she’s wearing a type of mask to cover her increasing disappointments. Stanley is a cruel man, and watching his cruelty to his wife (including his beating her) and to Blanche was unpleasant. A Streetcar Named Desire is not a pleasant or happy play.

The back cover of the edition of the play that I read indicated that Stanley pushed Blanche over the edge. Reading the play once, I am still not sure what happened in the end. Was Stanley lying, or had Blanche lied? Was Blanche crazy, or was Stanley simply trying to make her life miserable? I am at a loss to truly explain it. But given the emotional draw of the entire play, I am certain there is more to be discovered as I revisit it in the future.
As for the title, I think it reflects the dreams that Blanche and others harbor. Blanche arrived at Stella’s home by taking a streetcar named “Desire.” And her entire life, it seems, has been lived by dreaming and hoping and desiring. Stanley’s sensual flirtation with Blanche adds another dimension to “desire.” The play is sexually charged and the characters in it – from weak Blanche to violent Stanley – are emotionally manipulative.
Yet, the play as a whole doesn’t seem manipulative. It seems complicated and real, as humans really are. Although I didn’t like it as much as I did the clearer Glass Menagerie, A Streetcar Named Desire still stands out as the most accurate portrayal of human nature. Since I didn’t quite understand it after one read, that seems quite appropriate: human nature is in many ways complex and unpleasant.(less)

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Sep 05, 2011

Derek rated it

Melodrama, class consciousness, abusive relationships, alcoholism, goofy dialog from fallen women in from the deep south: yep, A Streetcar Named Desire is a Tennessee Williams play, all right.

There's plenty to love here, but something about this play failed to draw me in, like The Glass Menagerie had when I read it years ago. Call it post-adolescent cynicism, maybe, or perhaps just a desire for more subtlety. These characters are drawn in broad strokes with primary colors (literally,...more

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Aug 01, 2011

Alyanna rated it

Shelves: senior-year

Alyanna Camacho
Book Review

In A Streetcar Named Desire Tennessee Williams presents a particular tragedy in that each character has his or her own tragic ending. Blanche’s tragedy is the most obvious as she is the one who is taken to a mental institution at the end, she was raped and she is alone. Stanley will have possibly lost the Stella’s love or sympathy. Stella lives with the man who raped her sister, she has to bare the burden of knowing that she could not help Blanche. M...more

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May 26, 2011

Gracen rated it

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"A Streetcar Named Desire" is a play that was written by Tennessee Williams in 1947. The main characters are Blanche DuBois, Stanley Kowalski, Stella Kowalski, and Mitch. Blanche is Stella's sister, and at first, she seems normal, but later you find out the truth. Stanley is Stella's husband and is very violent and does not like Blanche living with them. One of the most famous scenes from this play is during a night of poker playing when Stanley hits Stella. After she leaves, he r...more

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May 26, 2011

Michelle rated it

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A Streetcar Named Desire is a play that features a woman named Blanche who struggles in life after losing her family’s home, Belle Reve, because she could not afford to keep it. Eventually, Blanche arrives at her sister’s apartment, looking for security and happiness in her life. Stella, Blanche’s sister, welcomes Blanche with open arms, but Stella’s husband, Stanley, decides that something is not right about Blanche. Soon Stanley comes to resent Blanche for her false personality and because she...more

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Apr 13, 2011

Megan Fletcher added it

"A Streetcar Named Desire" is a play by American playwright Tennessee Williams. This work won both the New York Drama Critics Circle Award and a Pulitzer Prize.

The play begins when Blanche Du Bois visits her sister Stella. Stell is married to Stanley Kowalski, a horrible man, in New Orleans near the stop of the streetcar named Desire. Blanche appears to be a lady but looks are deceiving. She soon begins to hang out with Mitch, a friend of Stanley.

Stanley learns t...more

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Feb 18, 2011

Nicole rated it

· review of another edition

We were handed this play yesterday in my English class and told to read scene 1 for Tuesday. I thought okay, no problem. I decided to get the reading done before I left for the long weekend and started it on my spare period with the intention of only reading the assigned section. Next thing I know, I'm finished the play.
I fell in love with the character of Blanche and her initial interactions and banter with Stanley. Right from the beginning you can see that she is clearly fragile and has b...more

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Feb 11, 2011

Hinch rated it

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A Street Car Named Desire is a play written in 1947 by Tennessee Williams. The story vividly illustrates the cultural clash that results when the proud but fading Blanche Dubois visits her sister Stella, in New Orleans. Affronted by her unexpected arrival and clamorous character, Stella's husband, Stanley, a confident, loud, and brutal man, challenges Blanche's poised and pretentious exterior.

The story symbolises the tension between the rising power of the industrial working class and ...more

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Dec 21, 2010

Joe Strong rated it

· review of another edition

If someone wanted to know about Tennessee Williams, this is the book to read. Set in the Deep South, the trysting place for all of Williams’ most successful works, the book is a triumph, Williams at his best. The exploration of the mind through the characters is something of a masterpiece; to find a novel that can do this is rare, to find a play; impossible. But that’s just him. With strong personal connotations, Williams’ sister having been taken to a mental institution and he himself living as...moreIf someone wanted to know about Tennessee Williams, this is the book to read. Set in the Deep South, the trysting place for all of Williams’ most successful works, the book is a triumph, Williams at his best. The exploration of the mind through the characters is something of a masterpiece; to find a novel that can do this is rare, to find a play; impossible. But that’s just him. With strong personal connotations, Williams’ sister having been taken to a mental institution and he himself living as an illegal homosexual, the exploration of a woman’s life, both past and present, is mesmerising.
But it is important to remember that A Streetcar Named Desire is a play, to be performed (though written in such a way that it could be read). And as a performance, it has become enshrined as one of the most successful and challenging plays in the world, with only the top actresses (Vivien Leigh, Glenn Close, Cate Blanchett and Rachel Weiss, to name a few) having pulled off the enigma that is Blanche. Her mental condition fragile, entering in a state of disarray, fabricating a life for herself, she ends up trapped in her cobweb of lies, so deep she even fools herself. The emotional journey of Blanche for me out shadows that of Medea and Hedda Gabler; her story is one that is rich with light and shade, moments of sadness, of comedy and dripping in tragedy.
However, A Streetcar isn’t just Blanche. The play also delves into the lives of her sister, Stella, and husband, Stanley, exploring the transitional nature of America and the relationships between sex, class and race. A crucial read for the study of 20th Century America, no doubt, but one that allows us to enter the lives of New Orleans citizens in such depth that it feels real. By no way is this play the be all and end all of American life, indeed, for a New York perspective, read Miller, perhaps. Yet, very few play writes, and none that I could immediately name, have come quite as close as Williams has to entering the great crevasses of the brain, the mind. To describe it is impossible, to read it fantastically simple.
To study or to read, this is by far one of the greatest plays ever.
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Sep 24, 2010

Mike Lawson rated it

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I love New Orleans. Seriously, if someone wrote a shitty cliched novel about a soldier sent off to war and the letters he wrote to his wife back in the states, I’d read it…as long as the wife lived in New Orleans.

Luckily, A Streetcar Named Desire wasn’t shitty and cliched, but it does take place in NOLA. Blanche DuBois is down on her luck and moves in with her sister Stella and Stella’s husband Stanley. Blanche has grown accustomed to living the high life, and isn’t too comfortabl...more

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Jun 04, 2010

Dafina added it · review of another edition

Shelves: advisory-2009-2010

this book was O.K., it didn't really cath my interest as much, so i wouldn't really recommend it. This book is about a young lady named Blanche and she goes to visit her sister Stella and stella's boyfriend stanley. she gets along well with stella, but not with stanley. blanche is very flirty and she gets with any guys. then she meets micheal, stanley's friend. they really like eachother untul micheal finds out who blanche really is. then he starts disliking her and telling her that she can't br...more

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May 13, 2010

Sal marked it as to-read · review of another edition

A Streetcar Named Desire was a play written by Tennessee Williams in the 1950s. The play is about a couple living in a small city in the state of Louisiana striving for a strong relationship. Who would know that one person could ruin this happenning. This person happens to be the wife's sister, Blanche. Blanche was once an elegant woman who needed no help living her life. One of the biggest reasons why she was like this was because of her early husband who ended up committing suicide. Many years...more

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Jan 27, 2010

Diana rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: scripts, 2010

I feel very strange about not giving this play five stars--it's Tennessee Williams, and (rightfully) it's a big deal classic. But somehow I just wasn't completely feeling it. It's a great play, to be sure, but so many of the themes in it seem unfinished, or underdeveloped in any case. It may just be that's I've grown up in a world on which Streetcar has already made its mark, so it doesn't impact me as much as it did it's first audiences, but even so I felt that there were so many unanswered ...more

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Sep 08, 2009

Naomi rated it

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Shelves: advisory-09-10

Reading A Streetcar Named Desire differed a lot from Cat on a Hot Tin Roof which made it a pleasure reading. Tennessee Williams once again proved his craft in the world of play writing with his protagonist Blanche Dubois. A schoolteacher from Mississippi, Blanche moves down to live with her sister Stella and her husband Stanley Kowalski in New Orleans. She tries to cover up her flaws with a "rich" persona, and her bossy, superior attitude; only to reveal later on that she loses the pla...more

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Sep 04, 2009

Ben rated it

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This play may very well be the great shining masterpiece of Modern American Theatre, and having not read it since high school, I felt like I was reading an altogether new work. I want to emphasize how very satisfying it is to read A Streetcar Name Desire verses seeing it performed. First and foremost is the poetic vigor and pitch-perfect metaphor that Tennessee Williams invests in his scene descriptions and character directions. Second is the meta-dialogue a personal reading inspires. Third,...more

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Aug 02, 2009

Kat rated it

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Shelves: book-to-film, classics, read-in-2009, borrowed-from-library

I've seen the 1951 film directed by Elia Kazan and was compelled to read the actual play afterward. Although I'd read Tennessee Williams in high school, this particular play was not a part of the curriculum (likely due to the play's content). I'm glad I didn't read this play when I was younger because I probably wouldn't appreciate it as much.

Williams writes great tragic characters, evidenced here in Blanche DuBois. She's pretty much off her rocker, and she's done a lot of regrettabl...more

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Nov 14, 2011

Brandi rated it

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Tennessee Williams’s play "A Streetcar Named Desire" represents the nuclear family and the morphed ideals post World War II. Stanley, a World War II veteran, represents the ideal nuclear family with his pregnant wife Stella and the desire to live in the suburb. He represents brutal modernism, ready to destroy the past, others, art, beauty, and innocence in order to achieve his own desires. The imagery representing him is territorial and animalistic; he is abusive to his wife in front o...more

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Sep 13, 2011

Andrew Rogers rated it

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I haven't had much experience reading plays, other than what I was assigned throughout my education, but this Tennessee Williams play drew me in from the first act. Williams presents several controversial themes in the A Streetcar Named Desire--including abusive relationships and alcoholism--which many people may disapprove of, but that doesn't take away from the fact that the play was effective in portraying what Williams wanted to get across. Stanley, one of the main characters in the play, re...more

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May 18, 2009

Ralph rated it

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“The desire of the man is for the woman, but the desire of the woman is for the desire of the man.”~Madame de Stael

I have never seen this movie, so I went into the book with a blank slate. It is a little difficult to review; however, there were definitely things I liked and didn't like. First, let's be honest, there really are no redeeming qualities in any of the characters. Who really cares what happens to any of them? In most cases, they had it coming. It would have been more fi...more

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Feb 09, 2012

Raquel King added it · review of another edition

This book was extremley interesting. I feel like Williams had to put himself in the mind of a girl, two girls: one normal one and the other mentally unstable; which couldn't possibly be easy. I love the repeated theme's and motif's that kept appearing. It wasn't hard to understand the book at all, but what was semi difficult was the fact that everything had a deeper meaning so you really had to think deeper. Williams know's how to make smooth tranisitions as well and he knows how to keep the sus...more

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Sep 17, 2011

Ann Santori rated it

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Shelves: read-2011

You know when a book is so good, you end up finishing it in an unusual place? The bathtub (sans water) because the light is bothering your partner, the floor because you're just too full of energy to sit like a proper human being? I turned the last page on A Streetcar Named Desire crouched on the basement rug with my Lab running around me, occasionally stopping to lick questioningly at the sides of the book, wondering what in the hell I was doing on the ground.

The depiction of a woman compli

...more

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Feb 14, 2011

Joanna rated it

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Shelves: plays, books-read-2011

I picked this up because this year is the centennial of Tennessee Williams' birth, and I'd never read it before.

It feels very much like a piece from a bygone era of theater. The characters are nuanced and memorable, the plot is straight forward, and the lines and cadences have a good bit of poetry in them.

"What you are talking about is brutal desire-just-Desire!-the name of that rattle-trap street-car that bangs through the Quarter, up one old narrow street and and do...moreI picked this up because this year is the centennial of Tennessee Williams' birth, and I'd never read it before.

It feels very much like a piece from a bygone era of theater. The characters are nuanced and memorable, the plot is straight forward, and the lines and cadences have a good bit of poetry in them.

"What you are talking about is brutal desire-just-Desire!-the name of that rattle-trap street-car that bangs through the Quarter, up one old narrow street and and down another..."

"Haven't you ever ridden on that street-car?"

"It brought me here.-Where I'm not wanted and where I'm ashamed to be."

It credits the audience with intelligence and discernment, to know and understand that there is more being discussed than on the surface.

Even the stage directions are rather gorgeous, in their way.

"It is first dark of an evening early in May. The sky that shows around the dim white building is a peculiarly tender blue, almost a turquoise, which invests the scene with a kind of lyricism and gracefully attenuates the atmosphere of decay. You can almost feel the warm breath of the brown river beyond the river warehouses with their faint redolences of bananas and coffee."

Do plays today still give you a sense of what a scene should smell like? Because Williams is excellent at that sort of thing. You feel the steam in the bathroom, smell the sticky perfume and the alcohol.

This did produce two extremely memorable stage roles in Blanche DuBois and Stanley Kowalski, and a lot of stand out scenes - especially when Mitch forces Blanche to be looked at in the light, and Blanche's being led off stage by the doctor from the mental institution while uttering her famous line about the kindness of strangers - but I don't think the story itself is especially durable.

Although the class tension itself is timeless, the way that it is expressed feels kind of dated. And the depiction of the main relationships between men and women are so brutal and animalistic that I'd at least like to think that we've evolved beyond that, at least a little, in the past sixty years.(less)

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Jan 18, 2011

Bruce rated it

This magnificent play pits two of Williams’ most memorable characters against one another. Blanche epitomizes the desperate struggle for lost youth and the fear of death that lead her into a frantic existence of lying and pretending. Stanley epitomizes raw sexuality and primal masculinity, the common man often extolled in American myth. They are on a collision course from the opening lines of the play. Their ballet of violence and desire is mediated by the tender, loving, and forgiving Stell...more

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About Tennessee Williams

Thomas Lanier Williams III, better known by the nickname Tennessee Williams, was a major American playwright of the twentieth century who received many of the top theatrical awards for his work. He moved to New Orleans in 1939 and changed his name to "Tennessee," the state of his father's birth. He won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for A Streetcar Named Desire in 1948 and for Cat on a Hot...moreThomas Lanier Williams III, better known by the nickname Tennessee Williams, was a major American playwright of the twentieth century who received many of the top theatrical awards for his work. He moved to New Orleans in 1939 and changed his name to "Tennessee," the state of his father's birth. He won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for A Streetcar Named Desire in 1948 and for Cat on a Hot Tin Roof in 1955. In addition, The Glass Menagerie (1945) and The Night of the Iguana (1961) received New York Drama Critics' Circle Awards. His 1952 play The Rose Tattoo (dedicated to his lover, Frank Merlo), received the Tony Award for best play.

Characters in his plays are often seen as representations of his family members. Laura Wingfield in The Glass Menagerie was understood to be modeled on Rose. Some biographers believed that the character of Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire is also based on her.

Amanda Wingfield in The Glass Menagerie was generally seen to represent Williams' mother, Edwina. Characters such as Tom Wingfield in The Glass Menagerie and Sebastian in Suddenly, Last Summer were understood to represent Williams himself. In addition, he used a lobotomy operation as a motif in Suddenly, Last Summer.

The Pulitzer Prize for Drama was awarded to A Streetcar Named Desire in 1948 and to Cat on a Hot Tin Roof in 1955. These two plays were later filmed, with great success, by noted directors Elia Kazan (Streetcar) with whom Williams developed a very close artistic relationship, and Richard Brooks (Cat). Both plays included references to elements of Williams' life such as homosexuality, mental instability, and alcoholism. Although The Flowering Peach by Clifford Odets was the preferred choice of the Pulitzer Prize jury in 1955 and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof was at first considered the weakest of the five shortlisted nominees, Joseph Pulitzer Jr., chairman of the Board, had seen Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and thought it worthy of the drama prize. The Board went along with him after considerable discussion.[18]

Williams wrote The Parade, or Approaching the End of a Summer when he was 29 and worked on it sporadically throughout his life. A semi-autobiographical depiction of his 1940 romance with Kip Kiernan in Provincetown, Massachusetts, it was produced for the first time on October 1, 2006 in Provincetown by the Shakespeare on the Cape production company, as part of the First Annual Provincetown Tennessee Williams Festival.

Other works by Williams include Camino Real and Sweet Bird of Youth.

His last play went through many drafts as he was trying to reconcile what would be the end of his life.[14] There are many versions of it, but it is referred to as In Masks Outrageous and Austere.(less)

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Quotes from A Streetcar Named Desire

“I don't want realism. I want magic! Yes, yes, magic! I try to give that to people. I misrepresent things to them. I don't tell the truth, I tell what ought to be the truth. And it that's sinful, then let me be damned for it!” — 106 people liked it

“Don't you just love those long rainy afternoons in New Orleans when an hour isn't just an hour - but a little piece of eternity dropped into your hands - and who knows what to do with it?” — 85 people liked it

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title link	preview: A Streetcar Named Desire
avg rating	preview: A Streetcar Named Desire Goodreads rating: 3.90 (35612 ratings)
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BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12222.A_Streetcar_Named_Desire?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166494182m/12222.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12222.A_Streetcar_Named_Desire?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams[/url]

A Streetcar Named Desire

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