Tennessee Williams

Let's get the boring part out of the way, shall we? You know how this story goes. "A Streetcar Named Desire" is set in New Orleans, on Elysian Fields Avenue. The leading lady would play the part of Blanche Dubois, who moves in with her sister, Stella. Stella's married to a man named Stanley, who's basically the definition of testosterone. Stanley beats Stella, and mistreats her, verbally and physically. When Blanche arrives, it throws a wrench into the way the Kowalakis do things, which Stanley is not okay with. Eventually, Stanley figures out Blanches past, and with that knowledge, he tried to mow her down, again and again, eventually leading to a rape, and a nervous breakdown. Stanley puts Blanche in a mental institution, and around this point, the curtains close. A moving tragedy, "A Streetcar Named Desire" gave Tennessee Williams his Pulitzer prize for drama.

Thomas (Tennessee) Williams. Born in 1911, he is one of the most recognized playwrights in 20th-century American history. Honored with honors in all of the top-notch areas, Mr. Williams holds a Tony, Pulitzer Prize for drama, and a Presidential Medal of Freedom. When he was born, Thomas suffered from a disease known as diphtheria, a respiratory tract infection which almost killed him as a child. Basically, it really messes with your throat and upper chest. Thomas's family wasn't exactly on the ball either. His older sister, Rose, struggled with mental health and eventually became incapacitated after a lobotomy. Rose is believed to be the inspiration for many of the female characters in Tennessee's plays. Mr. Williams father, Cornelius, was as manly as they get, drinking and loud behavior and whatnot. Cornelius Williams thought nothing of his son's problems, and was unhappy with his marriage.

Thomas moved around a lot as a child, and with his family's problems, he didn't have that many friends. He turned to writing, and at age 16, he won 3rd place for a short story he'd written. College wasn't fun either. Failing at military training, his father put him in a shoe factory, which Thomas hated. A 9-5 hour job gave him a detachment from reality, and drove his passion to write more and more. He'd write every week, and became caught up in creating these new people, these new worlds where anything he created happened. Unfortunately, there wasn't much success in his early writing.

In 1938, he attended dramatic theater workshops in New York. He loved them. He found a comfort in theater folk. He adopted the nickname "Tennessee", and he set off to write.

This is about the time you'd expect to see a montage of Tennessee Williams making it to the top. Unlike theater, you can't change the set and dim the lights and expect things to be alwright. It was a long uphill trek to recognition. In the late

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