Essay --

"The Glass Menagerie" by Tennessee Williams shows the struggle of two people to fit into society, Tom and Laura, and how society wouldn't accept them. They were the dreamers that were unjustly kept out and you may even go as far as to say persecuted into staying out and aloof like the other dreamers which are forced to become outcasts and not contribute to the actions of all. Tom and Laura, the two dreamers, were pushed by their mom, Amanda, to her frame of mind and the thoughts of a hard working society. They both stumbled on the fire escape which served as a gateway, physically and mentally. Tom had the problem of fitting in at the warehouse were he worked, because is the warehouse really a place for someone like him and his mind rebelled. Lastly you can see how society forced them to change and Laura to lose her status in order to fit in with Jim and that's shown by the horn breaking. Tom then realizes that and leaves which causes him to change too. Tennessee Williams artfully depicted this. The fire escape. A downtrodden red thing off the sides of buildings showing societies ineffectual escape from itself. In this case it served as a passageway between the real world and the dream one that Laura and Tom were living in at home. Both somehow stumbled both physically and mentally. When Laura said â€Å"I'm all right. I slipped but I'm all right†(47). She was trying to pass to the real world to do a real job and couldn't because of societies â€Å"inability† to accept her and her ways. She wasn't strong enough to make the trip by herself, but needed the moral support of the other dreamer in the area, which was Tom who came running out. Tom is the one who stumbles mentally in his inability to look at t... ...lizing that he was changing to Amanda's way of thinking, so he left. upon his leaving he lost his dreaming ability anyway. It was ironic how he no longer dreamed because he felt he was seeing the dreams in real life, as society had again forced him out. As you can see Tom and Laura were dreamers which were unaccepted into society. Laura lost her dreaming when the unicorn lost it's horn and tom then lost his upon doing the first thing he had dreamed about because he stayed that way and didn't dream about going any higher. Ultimately Tennessee Wiliiams message was that society was rigid and it forced those which did not fit the mold to change into a from which was acceptable. That we killed the dreamers and are till doing it at an even younger age. We have to Accept them with open arms if ever we are able to make it far into the future and survive.