Tennessee Williams A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)

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Tennessee Williams A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) excerpts BLANCHE. I, I, I took the blows on my face and my body! All those deaths! The long parade to the graveyard. Father, Mother, Margaret that dreadful way. So big with it, she couldn't be put in a coffin, but had to be burned like rubbish! You came just in time for funerals Stella. And funerals are pretty compared to death. Funerals are quiet, but deaths not always. Sometimes their breathing is hoarse, sometimes it rattles, sometimes they cry out to you, “Don’t let me go!” Even the old sometimes say it- “Don’t let me go”. As if you could stop them! Funerals are quiet, with pretty flowers. And oh, what lovely boxes they pack you away in! Unless you were there at the bed when they cried out “Hold me” you’d never suspect there was struggle for breath and bleeding. You didn’t dream, but I saw! Saw! And now you sit there telling me with your eyes that I let the place go. How in hell do you think all that sickness and dying was paid for? Death is expensive Miss Stella! And old Cousin Jessie, right after Margaret’s, hers! The Grim Reaper put his tent up on our doorstep! Stella, Belle Reve was his headquarters. Honey, that’s how it slipped through my fingers. Which of them left us a fortune? Which of them left us a cent of insurance even? Only poor Jessie- one hundred to pay for her coffin. That was it Stella! And I with my pitiful salary at the school! Yes, accuse me! Sit there and stare at me, thinking I let the place go. I let the place go! Where were you Stella? In bed with your Polack! [..] It won't be the sort of thing you have in mind. This man is a gentleman - he respects me. What he wants is my companionship. Having great wealth sometimes makes people lonely. A cultivated woman - a woman of breeding and intelligence - can enrich a man's life immeasurably. I have those things to offer, and time doesn't take them away. Physical beauty is passing - a transitory possession. But beauty of the mind, richness of the spirit, tenderness of the heart - I have all those things - aren't taken away but grow! Increase with the years! Oh! Strange that I should be called a destitute woman when I have all these treasures locked in my heart. I think of myself as a very, very rich woman. But I have been foolish - casting my pearls before....(swine). Yes, swine! And I'm thinking not only of you, but of your friend Mr. Mitchell. He came here tonight, he did, coming in his work clothes, to repeat slander, vicious stories he'd gotten from you. I gave him his walking papers. But then he returned, he returned with a box of roses to beg my forgiveness. He implored my forgiveness. Some things are not forgivable. Deliberate cruelty is not forgivable. It is the one unforgivable thing, in my opinion, and the one thing of which I have never, never been guilty. So I said to him, 'Thank you,' but it was foolish to think that we could ever adapt ourselves to each other. Our ways of life are too different. Our backgrounds are incompatible. So farewell, my friend and let there be no hard feelings.

Tennessee Williams

A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)

excerpts

BLANCHE. I, I, I took the blows on my face and my body! All those deaths! The long parade to the graveyard. Father, Mother, Margaret that dreadful way. So big with it, she couldn't be put in a coffin, but had to be burned like rubbish! You came just in time for funerals Stella. And funerals are pretty compared to death. Funerals are quiet, but deaths not always. Sometimes their breathing is hoarse, sometimes it rattles, sometimes they cry out to you, “Don’t let me go!” Even the old sometimes say it- “Don’t let me go”. As if you could stop them! Funerals are quiet, with pretty flowers. And oh, what lovely boxes they pack you away in! Unless you were there at the bed when they cried out “Hold me” you’d never suspect there was struggle for breath and bleeding. You didn’t dream, but I saw! Saw! And now you sit there telling me with your eyes that I let the place go. How in hell do you think all that sickness and dying was paid for? Death is expensive Miss Stella! And old Cousin Jessie, right after Margaret’s, hers! The Grim Reaper put his tent up on our doorstep! Stella, Belle Reve was his headquarters. Honey, that’s how it slipped through my fingers. Which of them left us a fortune? Which of them left us a cent of insurance even? Only poor Jessie- one hundred to pay for her coffin. That was it Stella! And I with my pitiful salary at the school! Yes, accuse me! Sit there and stare at me, thinking I let the place go. I let the place go! Where were you Stella? In bed with your Polack!

[..]

It won't be the sort of thing you have in mind. This man is a gentleman - he respects me. What he wants is my companionship. Having great wealth sometimes makes people lonely. A cultivated woman - a woman of breeding and intelligence - can enrich a man's life immeasurably. I have those things to offer, and time doesn't take them away. Physical beauty is passing - a transitory possession. But beauty of the mind, richness of the spirit, tenderness of the heart - I have all those things - aren't taken away but grow! Increase with the years! Oh! Strange that I should be called a destitute woman when I have all these treasures locked in my heart. I think of myself as a very, very rich woman.

But I have been foolish - casting my pearls before....(swine). Yes, swine! And I'm thinking not only of you, but of your friend Mr. Mitchell. He came here tonight, he did, coming in his work clothes, to repeat slander, vicious stories he'd gotten from you. I gave him his walking papers. But then he returned, he returned with a box of roses to beg my forgiveness. He implored my forgiveness. Some things are not forgivable. Deliberate cruelty is not forgivable. It is the one unforgivable thing, in my opinion, and the one thing of which I have never, never been guilty. So I said to him, 'Thank you,' but it was foolish to think that we could ever adapt ourselves to each other. Our ways of life are too different. Our backgrounds are incompatible. So farewell, my friend and let there be no hard feelings.