Q. Discuss the dramatic effectiveness of the following scene. (Scene 3 from ' Tom: Yesterday you confiscated my books!..' to 'Amanda [in an awful voice] I won't speak to you- until you apologise!')
This scene follows Amanda's decision to find gentlemen caller for Laura. The audience can feel the added emotional pressure to the already tense relationships among the Wingfields. Amanda's preoccupation with this idea makes Laura more nervous and Tom more uncomfortable at home. We know this as in this text Tom loses himself to his anger and the light is on Laura's reactions the whole time Tom and Amanda are arguing.
Amanda's need to control her children's lives is prominent in this text. Tom says, 'Yesterday you confiscated my books! You had the nerve to-' and Amanda calls the book, 'hideous book by that insane Mr Lawrence.'. During the time in which this plan is set, D.H. Lawrence wrote controversial novels, emphasising on society's dark aspects. Such bookstore looked down upon by the upper class. Here, Amanda's wish to be part of upperclass society and fear of what her son is influenced by is dramatised. Furthermore the father's presence is dramatised , we see Amanda wearing his bath robe, which is oversized on her, reflecting the overpowering burden of being a single mother and a rejected woman. The fact that near the end Tom says in anger, 'Why, listen, if self is what I thought of, Mother, I'd be where he is- GONE!', this adds to the already dark atmosphere, the irony that he is being called selfish while sacrificing his life his dreams in a shoe factory, that too by his mother. Williams also provides stage directions such as red smoke that represents anger and resentment thus lulling the audience into a sure sense of dread.
William further creates dramatic tension in this scene when Tom tries to desperately explain how he is unhappy to Amanda and she answers him with accusations instead. He therefore gives up and instead becomes blisteringly sarcastic, proving himself a gifted 'actor' as he launches himself into a parody of what he believes Amanda is wanting to hear. He concludes by openly mocking Amanda and attempts to leave. During this attempt he swings his coat and breaks Laura's glass menagerie. The dramatic irony here is that yet again he is held back from leaving by the thought of his sister and that is why her presence haunts his memory and the entire play's focus is on her. We see how she tries to mediate Amanda and Tom's fight, '-Tom!' when she realises he is about to go too far but he does not stop until she screams, 'My glass!-menagerie..' and the music begins to play.
Ironically while Amanda condemns the father for leaving them, at the end of this scene she is so blinded by rage or disappointment that she leaves her children to pick up the shattered glass, reflecting the now shattered bonds of the Wingfield family, on their own ironically just like their father left them and the audience is left to sympathise with the children and invest themselves deeper into their story. At the end when Tom 'drops awkwardly on his knees to collect the fallen glass, glancing at Laura as if he would speak but couldn't.' adds a dramatic effect that has the audience wondering, what would he have said? Would it have changed anything or nothing? Thus Williams dramatises the real struggles of a broken family.