Tennessee Williams on Love and Ego
“If I got rid of my demons, I’d lose my angels.”
― Tennessee Williams
Like Faulkner, Tennessee Williams, one of America's most renowned playwrights, was a personage of the South, having been born and raised in the Mississippi Delta—one of my favorite regions in the country. His early influences formed the concept of his “American Theatre.” Some prominent themes Williams explores in his works are death and mortality, family relationships, loneliness and isolation, desire and longing, and illusion vs. reality.
He once remarked: “I’ve never cared whether I shock people because I think people shocked by the truth are not deserving of the truth. The truth is something one has to deserve.”
Williams frequently incorporates elements of Southern Gothic literature into his plays, featuring themes of decay, grotesque characters, and the haunting influence of the past on the present. Many of his characters seek refuge in fantasy worlds or use escapism as a means of coping with their struggles. However, these illusions often prove to be fragile and unsustainable in the face of reality.
The following is a profound passage Tennessee Williams wrote in a 1947 letter.
In this letter, Williams reflects on the dynamic and complex relationships between the characters in his plays. Themes of love, resentment, and betrayal often surface in his exploration of family dynamics. And he believed it to be a grave mistake to view these “living relationships”, convoluted and complicated as they are, through the distorted lens of black and white. Good and bad.