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Spring Storm
"A crucible of so many elements that would later shape and characterize Williams's work."― World Literature Today When Tennessee Williams read Spring Storm aloud to his playwriting class at the University of Iowa in 1938, he was met with silence and embarrassment. His professor, the renowned E. C. Mabie, remarked as he got up and dismissed the seminar, "Well, we all have to paint our nudes!" Tom's earlier comment in his journal that the play "is well-constructed, no social propaganda, and is suitable for the commercial stage" seems accurate enough in 1999, but woefully naive deep in the Depression when the play's sexual explicitness―particularly its matter-of-fact acceptance of a woman's right to her own sexuality―would have been seen as not only shocking but also politically radical. Spring Storm would later be disavowed by the author as "simply a study of Sex―a blind animal urge or force (like the regenerative force of April) gripping four lives and leading them into a tangle of cruel and ugly relations." But the solid and deft characterizations of the four young people whose lives intertwine―the sexually alive Heavenly Critchfield, her earthy lover Dick Miles, Heavenly's wealthy but tongue-tied admirer Arthur Shannon, and the repressed librarian Hertha Nielson who loves Arthur―are archetypes of characters we will meet again and again in the Williams canon. Epic in scope, a bit melodramatic in execution, tragic in outcome, Spring Storm created a wave of excitement among theatre insiders when it was given a staged reading at The Ensemble Studio Theatre's Octoberfest '96. This edition has been prepared, with an illuminating introduction, by Dan Isaac, who initiated the Octoberfest production.
166 pages, Paperback
First published December 17, 1999
10 people are currently reading
204 people want to read
About the author
Tennessee Williams
754 books3,690 followersThomas 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.
Raised in St. Louis, Missouri, after years of obscurity, at age 33 he became famous with the success of The Glass Menagerie (1944) in New York City. This play closely reflected his own unhappy family background. It was the first of a string of successes, including A Streetcar Named Desire (1947), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955), Sweet Bird of Youth (1959), and The Night of the Iguana (1961). With his later work, he attempted a new style that did not appeal to audiences. His drama A Streetcar Named Desire is often numbered on short lists of the finest American plays of the 20th century, alongside Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman.
Much of Williams' most acclaimed work has been adapted for the cinema. He also wrote short stories, poetry, essays and a volume of memoirs. In 1979, four years before his death, Williams was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.
From Wikipedia
Raised in St. Louis, Missouri, after years of obscurity, at age 33 he became famous with the success of The Glass Menagerie (1944) in New York City. This play closely reflected his own unhappy family background. It was the first of a string of successes, including A Streetcar Named Desire (1947), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955), Sweet Bird of Youth (1959), and The Night of the Iguana (1961). With his later work, he attempted a new style that did not appeal to audiences. His drama A Streetcar Named Desire is often numbered on short lists of the finest American plays of the 20th century, alongside Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman.
Much of Williams' most acclaimed work has been adapted for the cinema. He also wrote short stories, poetry, essays and a volume of memoirs. In 1979, four years before his death, Williams was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.
From Wikipedia
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Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews
March 24, 2018
It was a really great experience to reread this after eight years or so. It remains one of my favourite plays, although there were a few problematic aspects I'm not sure I'd noticed as a younger reader/watcher. I love the creation of the characters, the situations and the exploration of 1930s Southern American society. I highly recommend this play.
September 21, 2019
A tragedy of ill-judged adolescent infatuations as much as sexual repression.
April 16, 2017
Williams' first play, and you can see the beginnings of genius but there is a lot of bullshit as well. Although it is interesting to see a female character so unapologetic about her sexuality for the time the play was written, it is underdone by the melodramatic and rushed ending.
May 6, 2015
Very dated period piece. Not among the best of Tennessee Williams' writings. It reads something like the 6th form would put on for a Parents' Night to show how sophisticated they were. The penultimate event and ending are just plain silly. Its no wonder no-one produced this play until 1996.
December 11, 2015
oh.my.god. Tennessee Williams ripping out my heart. This play is required reading for my acting class next semester and I can see why. I tend to neglect reading the classic playwrights because their writing feels dated so its difficult for me to get invested. However, I was terribly invested in every character in this play. I would kill to see this live. I would probably also cry my eyes out - if it's done correctly. Also, this makes me want to read everything Tennessee Williams has done. Also, one day I want to play Hertha. Done. 5/5 stars.
August 11, 2014
Rougher than some of Williams' other plays, but just as heartbreaking and filled with his typical Southern charm and swagger. Perhaps not the best book to read given my current emotional state, but it's strangely comforting to be reminded that love is a universal struggle.
August 28, 2025
Spring Storm by Tennessee Williams
A different version of this note and thoughts on other books are available at:
- https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list... and http://realini.blogspot.ro/
This is a superb work.
And I nearly missed the magnitude with a rather superficial, condemnable approach for the first few scenes.
Alhamdulillah, I managed to find the needed concentration and then realized what a gem and a pleasure I was about to miss.
For even if this is not A Street Car Named Desire and Heavenly is not Stella, Spring Storm is a meaningful play.
The themes are thought provoking and challenging, the dialogue is splendid, the characters complex and intriguing.
All the ingredients for a fabulous narrative are here.
And in the introduction, the public learns that the author’s sister was committed to an institution on the year Williams wrote the play
Tennessee Williams’ own sister was diagnosed with “dementia praecox” or “precocious madness” which is a disused psychiatric diagnosis.
Schizophrenia would be the term utilized today.
The author was disturbed by the illness and his own part in not being supportive as he could have been.
One day, when she was asking him for help he said that:
- She disgusted him- and we hear that in the play
In the introduction to the play, we also learn that the play was re-discovered, after having a poor initial reception.
Tennessee Williams wrote in his diary:
“Read the final version of my second act and it was finally, quite, quite finally rejected by the class because of Heavenly's weakness as a character. Of course, it is very frightening and discouraging to work on a thing and then have it fall flat. There is still a chance they may be wrong-- all of them-- I have to cling to that chance....” [1]
The author has also stated that the play is about four people and their sexuality, how the four lines clash and get entangled.
The presenter of the play also mentions that it is clearly very autobiographical, in terms of material about his own sexuality…
Also his sister and other members of the family
I for one thought Heavenly a strong enough character, even if I do not totally fancy her, in fact I thought Arthur superior, intellectually and maybe morally to her…
Up to the point where Arthur follows the advice of the woman he thinks he loves and maybe even does and gets drunk.
Arthur Shannon has been a shy, bullied boy and he explains his feelings at one stage referring to the author Strindberg:
- “Love hatred”, maybe thinking of: “I hated her now with a hatred more fatal than indifference because it was the other side of love.”
Since Arthur might have been perceived as too metaphysical- a term he uses in front of heavenly who has no idea what it means and might have never considered metaphysical thoughts- the woman he thinks he loves is involved in a relationship with Dick Miles, who is despised by the family and is the one who bullied Arthur when they were kids.
Arthur asks Heavenly to marry him and after that, Dick wants her to move with him on a government project, where he has found a job.
There are class differences and what I thought is a considerable intellectual gap between Heavenly and Arthur.
The family thinks Dick outrageous as a match for Heavenly, given his “low class”, but I also thought that in time, there would be a clash between Arthur and his evident preoccupation with matters of the mind and Heavenly, who appears to be so naïve, to use a mild term, in terms of intellectual concerns.
As stated, the characters are complex and intriguing, so another aspect is that Arthur does not know how to “make love”, by which a very different thing was meant in the thirties, when that was just the foreplay that people think about today.
In one scene, Heavenly asks her father something like:
- Why do people torture each other, even when they are in love?!?
- It is like the Spring Storm!
- People get killed by it, but it is a natural process, part of the renewal of life…
Maybe this is where the name of the play comes from.
Even if the critics dismissed it when it was released and I did not enjoy the first few scenes, I now consider it very good and I have enjoyed it thoroughly.
A different version of this note and thoughts on other books are available at:
- https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list... and http://realini.blogspot.ro/
This is a superb work.
And I nearly missed the magnitude with a rather superficial, condemnable approach for the first few scenes.
Alhamdulillah, I managed to find the needed concentration and then realized what a gem and a pleasure I was about to miss.
For even if this is not A Street Car Named Desire and Heavenly is not Stella, Spring Storm is a meaningful play.
The themes are thought provoking and challenging, the dialogue is splendid, the characters complex and intriguing.
All the ingredients for a fabulous narrative are here.
And in the introduction, the public learns that the author’s sister was committed to an institution on the year Williams wrote the play
Tennessee Williams’ own sister was diagnosed with “dementia praecox” or “precocious madness” which is a disused psychiatric diagnosis.
Schizophrenia would be the term utilized today.
The author was disturbed by the illness and his own part in not being supportive as he could have been.
One day, when she was asking him for help he said that:
- She disgusted him- and we hear that in the play
In the introduction to the play, we also learn that the play was re-discovered, after having a poor initial reception.
Tennessee Williams wrote in his diary:
“Read the final version of my second act and it was finally, quite, quite finally rejected by the class because of Heavenly's weakness as a character. Of course, it is very frightening and discouraging to work on a thing and then have it fall flat. There is still a chance they may be wrong-- all of them-- I have to cling to that chance....” [1]
The author has also stated that the play is about four people and their sexuality, how the four lines clash and get entangled.
The presenter of the play also mentions that it is clearly very autobiographical, in terms of material about his own sexuality…
Also his sister and other members of the family
I for one thought Heavenly a strong enough character, even if I do not totally fancy her, in fact I thought Arthur superior, intellectually and maybe morally to her…
Up to the point where Arthur follows the advice of the woman he thinks he loves and maybe even does and gets drunk.
Arthur Shannon has been a shy, bullied boy and he explains his feelings at one stage referring to the author Strindberg:
- “Love hatred”, maybe thinking of: “I hated her now with a hatred more fatal than indifference because it was the other side of love.”
Since Arthur might have been perceived as too metaphysical- a term he uses in front of heavenly who has no idea what it means and might have never considered metaphysical thoughts- the woman he thinks he loves is involved in a relationship with Dick Miles, who is despised by the family and is the one who bullied Arthur when they were kids.
Arthur asks Heavenly to marry him and after that, Dick wants her to move with him on a government project, where he has found a job.
There are class differences and what I thought is a considerable intellectual gap between Heavenly and Arthur.
The family thinks Dick outrageous as a match for Heavenly, given his “low class”, but I also thought that in time, there would be a clash between Arthur and his evident preoccupation with matters of the mind and Heavenly, who appears to be so naïve, to use a mild term, in terms of intellectual concerns.
As stated, the characters are complex and intriguing, so another aspect is that Arthur does not know how to “make love”, by which a very different thing was meant in the thirties, when that was just the foreplay that people think about today.
In one scene, Heavenly asks her father something like:
- Why do people torture each other, even when they are in love?!?
- It is like the Spring Storm!
- People get killed by it, but it is a natural process, part of the renewal of life…
Maybe this is where the name of the play comes from.
Even if the critics dismissed it when it was released and I did not enjoy the first few scenes, I now consider it very good and I have enjoyed it thoroughly.
November 13, 2021
This forgotten play by Tennessee Williams is deeply disturbing, yet compelling with its searing emotions. Williams' characters reflect the casual racism and deep misogyny--not to mention volcanic homophobia--of the Mississippi Delta during the Depression. There's no protest against the neanderthal thinking of the characters, but I don't see Williams nodding along approvingly either. It's an unflinching depiction of a corrupt world by a man who had escaped it and was trying to make sense of it.
January 15, 2019
A far cry from the brilliant work he would eventually create, but perhaps because the play has been put together from the jigsaw puzzles of text and notes he left behind.
I see prototypes of the TW characters I've grown familiar with. Heavenly can be the young Blanche, Richard Miles as Stanley Kowalski, Mrs Critchfield the overbearing mother in The Glass Menagerie and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.
Kudos to Dan Isaac for his extensive research and work in getting this published.
I see prototypes of the TW characters I've grown familiar with. Heavenly can be the young Blanche, Richard Miles as Stanley Kowalski, Mrs Critchfield the overbearing mother in The Glass Menagerie and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.
Kudos to Dan Isaac for his extensive research and work in getting this published.
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May 24, 2024You can tell this is one of Williams’ first - but you can also tell it’s not his last. Spring Storm reeks of promise and, even through the plot rushes and occasional confusion, Williams’ brilliance really seeps through. Dying to do the Heavenly or Hertha scenes in Act 1. A shame Williams never got to see this performed!
August 4, 2020
Really great play, the first I’ve read of Tennessee Williams. Clearly socially outdated, it was unique to see Heavenly written with such agency and original thought. I’m excited to dig deeper into his career.
September 5, 2020
It’s astonishing to see Williams reveal truths about American life, family, personal desires, the feel of nature, and the tragic arc of human existence in just one play.
February 4, 2022
a girl, torn between a rugged country freak and a fairy nerd. the ending is so perfect.
November 3, 2024
Early whispers of genius....
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February 3, 2025Tiene una energía desbordante, y un manejo del bochorno muy admirable.
July 10, 2025
There are moments of Williams' brilliance, but this is not a very good play.
September 22, 2025
Favorite Quote = “I want what I'm afraid of and I'm afraid of what I want so that I'm like a storm inside that can't break loose!”
March 13, 2017
A rebellious Southern debutante from a falling from grace family is torn, romantically, between a blue collar sexual beast and a learned stuffy rich boy. Throw in a brewing Spring tempest, a Southern town of repressed, status obsessed adults, and you've got yourself the first Tennessee Williams play, SPRING STORM.
Reading it now, knowing his oeuvre, it seems like almost a parody someone wrote. The drama is quite compelling, but is at times very over the top. The obvious conclusion isn't very satisfying and it also suffers from having no really likable characters (okay maybe the tragically single 'homely' girl who works in the library).
Pretty standard Williams fair, but not wholly without appeal. With that I present the most incredible piece of Tennessee Williams dialogue put to page (from the monologue where the rich boy is trying to bang the librarian):
"Thrown over for a boy that clerks in a drugstore because he knows how to make love and I don't! Well now I can, too. I can get drunk and act like the rest of them. How about it, Miss Neilson? Why don't you come out from behind those tortoise-shell glasses of yours?"
Reading it now, knowing his oeuvre, it seems like almost a parody someone wrote. The drama is quite compelling, but is at times very over the top. The obvious conclusion isn't very satisfying and it also suffers from having no really likable characters (okay maybe the tragically single 'homely' girl who works in the library).
Pretty standard Williams fair, but not wholly without appeal. With that I present the most incredible piece of Tennessee Williams dialogue put to page (from the monologue where the rich boy is trying to bang the librarian):
"Thrown over for a boy that clerks in a drugstore because he knows how to make love and I don't! Well now I can, too. I can get drunk and act like the rest of them. How about it, Miss Neilson? Why don't you come out from behind those tortoise-shell glasses of yours?"
January 23, 2015
Ehh, I found myself getting bored quickly with Spring Storm, unfortunately. Maybe it's because I have high standards for Tennessee Williams, seeing as he is widely regarded as a playwright of high caliber. This being said, there has to be a first work for every person in the field of literature; as this is Mr. Williams' first, I excuse him for making such a dull play.
From what I could ascertain, this is a play dealing with the rite of passage from adolescence to adulthood in the deep South, characterized by romance and competition. Although I was bored most of the time, I do admit to one thing: I was rooting for the young librarian who was in love with Arthur, so I actually was very sad when things turned out the way they did.
I will be continuing to read through Tennessee Williams' plays chronologically as a mini-project, seeing as I just received the complete works for Christmas. Yay me!
From what I could ascertain, this is a play dealing with the rite of passage from adolescence to adulthood in the deep South, characterized by romance and competition. Although I was bored most of the time, I do admit to one thing: I was rooting for the young librarian who was in love with Arthur, so I actually was very sad when things turned out the way they did.
I will be continuing to read through Tennessee Williams' plays chronologically as a mini-project, seeing as I just received the complete works for Christmas. Yay me!
January 5, 2015
This is Williams' earliest produced play with subtle hints of his future dramatic talents intertwined throughout. What's important to remember is how young Williams was when he wrote this stage play (27); his braveness of his disclosure of emotional output; and his ability to write a full length play with characters as in depth as Heavenly (who would reappear in Sweet Bird of Youth) and her mother, Mrs. Critchfield, who no doubt is the earlier model of Amanda Wingfield, the self-consumed mother, in The Glass Menagerie. Williams' family were clearly his literary muses and he used them ingeniously in his most popular and lauded works.
Read to see the beginnings of one of our greatest playwrights. Read in order to understand the first steps taken on a road to remarkable achievement. You will not be disappointed unless you are unwilling to retrace genius.
Read to see the beginnings of one of our greatest playwrights. Read in order to understand the first steps taken on a road to remarkable achievement. You will not be disappointed unless you are unwilling to retrace genius.
March 7, 2011
By Tennessee Williams. A radio adaptation of the Royal and Derngate, Northampton production, broadcast to mark the centenary of the playwright's birth. Heavenly Critchfield has almost everything a young woman could desire, but when she's forced to decide between respectable suitor Arthur and handsome, wild lover Dick, her actions cause a chain of consequences that tear their lives apart.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006tnwj
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006tnwj
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 29, 2013
Spring Storm is a classic deep South tale of adolescent rites of passage, with rich and vivid writing, and a direct approach to issues of sexuality, class, and mental distress. On the Mississippi delta, the well-born Heavenly Critchfield finds herself torn between two admirers: the earthy, restless Dick Miles and the spineless, moneyed Arthur Shannon. When she is forced to choose between them, her actions cause a chain of consequences that tear their lives apart.
January 18, 2011
my favorite williams play although not a terribly happy ending for the librarian...
March 20, 2011
An early (in fact the first) Tennessee Williams play which makes an interesting comparison with Somerset Maugham's 'The Razor's Edge'
March 6, 2014
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 22, 2015
Another fun early Williams play that was way ahead of its time.
January 2, 2024
Great for Williams fans. Feels like an artist's sketch for later works.
Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews