1. Tennessee Williams A Streetcar Named Desire
American International School, Lusaka
September, 2009
Ms. Jeffery and the Class of 2011

2. New Orleans
The city of New Orleans, Louisiana was Williams’ principal literary muse

3. The architecture in this area of New Orleans is primarily Spanish.
The French Quarter
The architecture in this area of New Orleans is primarily Spanish.

4. Galatoire’s Restaurant
This is one of the most famous restaurants and was frequented by Williams. Stella mentions taking Blanche there for supper in Scene Two of the play.

5. Streetcars
The famous New Orleans streetcar line immortalized in Williams’ play is the oldest continuously operating street railway line in the United States.

6. Other Locations
Pontchartrain Beach is the amusement park that Blanche and Mitch visit on their date before scene two of Act II, on the northern edge of the city, New Orleans.

7. Moon Lake Casino
Moon Lake Casino, the site of Blanche’s young husband, Allan Grey’s suicide is located in Dundee, Mississippi.

8. Belle Reve
Williams named the DuBois plantation home after a country club in St. Louis, Missouri, called Bellerive which he visited with his father when he was younger. The country club is still in operation today.

9. Cultural References The Napoleonic Code
It looks to me like you have been swindled, baby, and when you’re swindled under the Napoleonic code, I’m swindled, too. And I don’t like to be swindled.
Stanley (Act One, Scene Two)

10. The Engineers’ Corps
Stanley was a decorated Master Sergeant in the Engineer’s Corps when Stella met him. Master Sergeant is a middling rank in the army.

11. Jax or Jack’s brand beer was a local favourite in New Orleans
Jax Beer Bottles
Jax or Jack’s brand beer was a local favourite in New Orleans

12. Only Poe! Only Mr. Edgar Allan Poe – could do it justice!
Blanche (Act One, Scene One)

13. Edgar Allan Poe Ulalume – Poe (1847)
The skies they were ashen and sober;
The leaves they were crisped and sere –
The leaves they were withering and sere;
It was night in the lonesome October
Of my most immemorial year:
It was hard by the dim lake of Auber,
It was down by the dank tarn of Auber,
In the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir …
Ulalume – Poe (1847)
Blanche evokes darkly Romantic imagery by associating famous Gothic author, Edgar Allan Poe with the run-down Kowalski apartment.

14. Vincent Van Gogh
The above painting – The Night Café – is by Dutch Expressionist painter, van Gogh and is referred to in Williams’ stage directions at the start of Act One, Scene Three.

15. Why, that’s my favourite sonnet by Mrs. Browning!
Elizabeth Browning
Why, that’s my favourite sonnet by Mrs. Browning!
Blanche (Act One, Scene Three)

16. Elizabeth Browning – Sonnet 43
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

17. La Dame Aux Camellias - Mucha
Je suis la Dame aux Camellias! Vous etes – Armand!
Blanche – Act Two, Scene Two

18. Huey Long Why weep or slumber, America? Land of brave and true
With castles and clothing and food for all
All belongs to you
Ev’ry man a King, ev’ry man a King
For you can be a millionaire
But there’s something belonging to others
There’s enough for all people to share
When it’s sunny June and December, too
Or in the Winter time or Spring
There’ll be peace without end
Ev’ry neighbor a friend
With Ev’ry man a King.
In Streetcar, Stanley references Huey Long’s famous political slogan, “Every Man a King.” which was recorded later as a song by Long himself.