The Glass Menagerie 10

In scene six Amanda explains to Laura her childhood while getting Laura ready for her gentlemen caller. Amanda reveals that she is unable to leave the past, when she was young, beautiful, and wanted by men. The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams shows Amanda’s unwillingness to leave her past and grasp reality. Williams conveys Amanda’s inability to connect to reality through setting, metaphor, motif and movement. Amanda in early scenes has been showing that longs for the days when she was younger.
Up until this point Amanda has only been talking about her gentlemen callers now she goes in to explain more about her younger years and lifestyles that she used to have. Her use of setting has been rare and she only used to explain how many callers there were. It takes a beautiful yellow dress with a blue sash to make her use setting. “I had malaria fever all that spring. The change of climate from East Tennessee to the Delta-weakened resistance.” From this we know it is spring in the Delta. Malaria is a symbol for what she is now, weak and sickly looking. He continues to use his setting to show when she did things. “Evening, dances! Afternoons, long, long rides! Picnics-lovely! So lovely that country in May-” May shows that it is spring which represents Amanda’s youth.   The setting is only part of the large metaphor Williams points out.
Amanda’s flashback about her childhood is more closely tied with her unwillingness to connect to reality using a metaphor. Amanda realizes her young years ran out and she was still trying to live her childhood. “Finally there were no more vases to hold them, every available space was filled with jonquils. No vases to hold them?” The jonquils represent Amanda’s young years when she was beautiful and wanted by her gentlemen callers. No more means unavailable. The vases represent the amount of years in her childhood. This is all one large metaphor meaning that her young years were everywhere but she tried to have so much of it at...