From the point of view of
Stella in the play. Written as an exercise when I performed the character in college:
My name is Stella Kowalski. I am 25-years-old and I have been married to Stanley Kowalski for a brief amount of time. In Act 1 Scene 1, my older sister Blanche comes to visit me and she has never met Stanley before. I also had not seen her myself since I married him. ( Scene 1 Blanche: “Will Stanley like me, or will I be just a visiting in-law, Stella?”) I never went to college and Stanley and I live in a lower middle-class area of New Orleans, which is quite different from where I grew up. ( Scene 1 Blanche: “...explain this place to me! What are you doing in a place like this?”) Stanley has a violent temper and he gets extremely rough with me at times, but I don’t really mind. Stanley represents the opposite of my past; the wildness and unpredictability of Stanley’s temper excites me.( Scene 4 When Blanche asks me why I didn’t get upset when Stanley smashed all the lightbulbs on our wedding night I said, “I was sort of thrilled by it.”) Blanche does not understand this or my decision to live where I live. Stanley brought me out of the world I’d once lived in and I am happy to have left it, although Blanche still exists in that world.
Although I don’t want to admit it, I really want Blanche to leave. She has entered our home and disrupted everything, driving Stanley crazy and taking his a lot attention away from me. I would have been like Blanche were it not for Stanley, and when she is there she causes me to act like my former self at times, which I hate. (In scene 3, I yell at Stanley with rage: “Drunk- drunk- animal thing, you!” and we have a big fight, caused indirectly by my sister.) I want Blanche to leave because I want Stanley and me to be happy again living in our own world. ( Scene 8, Stanley attempts to reassure me by saying, “Stell, it’s gonna be all right after she goes and after you’ve had the baby. It’s gonna be all right again between you and me and the way that it was.”)
I cannot directly force my sister out of the house because I know that she’s in trouble, therefore I must have a reason for her to leave, and Stanley can help me with this. (In scene 11 we send her away to a mental institution claiming that she’s crazy- she tells me that Stanley raped her but I refuse to believe her.) Blanche can hurt me because she represents everything I’d wanted to flee from, and she can destroy my world with Stanley by trying to force realizations onto me. For although Stanley loves me he is filled with an implacable rage shown clearest when he rapes Blanche. (In scene 11 I remark to Eunice, “I couldn’t believe her story and go on living with Stanley.”) My deepest fear is that my world with Stanley could be destroyed, and by refusing to believe my sister I am refusing to let go of that world.
In order to get Blanche out of the picture I must send her away to a mental institution. I am a threat to Blanche because I am able to do this. I can induce Stanley to do things because he does love me. (By me leaving during scene 3 due to his rage, he cries for me to return and I get him to show his real and unabandoned affection for me.)
I expect to make Blanche leave because that is what I must do in order to restore my and my husband’s life. Stanley also wishes her out of the picture and we both make her leave. When Blanche finally does leave, I am not fully restored and I will never feel completely better because deep down I know the truth and I know it was wrong to send her away. (In the end of scene 11 I sob uncontrollably while Stanley tries to comfort me.)