The Glass Menagerie

Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie is a play about an incomplete family in which each character is expected in some way to take the place of the missing member in order to make the family function. The play is about Amanda Wingfield, whose husband abandoned her long ago, and her two adult children, Tom and Laura. The play centers on Tom's guilt as he looks back at the last time he was together with his family. Following the visit of a "gentleman caller," who was the family's last possible hope of replacing the father, Tom abandoned his mother and sister--although he had no idea how they could care for themselves. Tom feels guilt and sorrow but he never says that he had any other choice. There was no way that he--any more than Laura or the visitor--could take the missing father's place and the audience is left to conclude that Amanda probably had to do it herself.

The Tom of the present is the play's narrator and the Tom of the past is a character in the memory play. As Tom introduces himself and the play he says that there is "a fifth character in the play who doesn't appear except in this larger-than-life-size photograph over the mantel" (23). The smiling young face of the father overlooks the scene and contrasts with the brutal man who simply abandoned his wife and children and sent them one post-card that said only "Hello-Goodbye!" (23). By abandoning the family he left them without economic support. One of the main functions of the family is to provide for

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later she tells him that she becomes afraid when he appears to act like his father. It would, of course, be normal for a mother to want her son to make an effort in life or not to want him to turn out badly. But underlying all her arguments, as Tom understands, is her need to have him support the family. Amanda also tries to be understanding about how young men might want adventure. But when she says, "Most young men find adventure in their careers," she knows she is deliberately missing Tom's point and that she wants to channel his life in a direction that will produce economic safety for herself and Laura (51). Amanda lives with a number of illusions--such as the stories about her past--but she also knows the hard facts of life very well and has no illusions about what she needs to do to protect herself and her daughter. She is "a universal type, a mother with the characteristic qualities of devotion to her offspring and determination to survive for their sakes," but she is also forced by circumstances to put many ordinary concerns aside (Griffin 23). She knows what she is doing to Tom in the same way she knew all along that Laura would probably not be capable of completing the course at the secretarial school. But she

Category: Literature - T