Quotation & Comment A Streetcar Named Desire

"They told me to take a streetcar named Desire, and then transfer to one called Cemeteries and ride six blocks and get off at Elysian Fields."

Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams

These words are uttered by Blanche DuBois when she first arrives at her sister Stella’s apartment called Elysian Fields in New Orleans.

It tells us she is on a journey. ‘They’ refers to the attendants at the station who give her directions.

Symbolically ‘They’ indicates Blanche is vulnerable and powerless. All the men in Blanche’s life - family and lovers - have always had power and followed their sexual desires. She too has lived like this and it has brought her to rejection and exile which is a form of death.

Here at Elysian Fields Blanche hopes to start again.