Blanche DuBois
- Often wears white, looks like a moth (attracted to the light, killed when finally achieved)
- "Her delicate beauty must avoid a strong light. There is something about her uncertain manner, as well as her white clothes, that suggests a moth
- Conceals her degenerate attitude and inner sins
- The stage directions keep her out of strong light
- “Turn off that over light!”
- Under the light, her age is more obvious, so she has an aversion to light
- Fear of being examined in a strong light because she’s hiding something
- Darkness conceals her bad secrets and darkness is equal to ignorance
- Her name means white of the woods: purity
- Woods symbolic of the beginning of life, “primival life”, cycle of life, running away,
- Very scheming, survives through scheming others (Shep)
- Pathological liar
- She claims she is a Virgo (Virgin)
- Attempts to assert herself as a brute and escape being the fragile in every relationship
- she grasps onto the arm of the doctor
- she wants to be taken care of
- Lost Belle Reve
- Uncles and Fathers sleep around and create illegitimate children
- She gives away land
- She went to the Flamingo because she lost everything and wanted to feel loved
Stella Kowalski
- Younger sister of Blanche
- Wife of Stanley
- Malleable to Blanche's desires
- a fragile in the relationship with Blanche
- Stella tells Blanche, “waiting on you reminds me of the past”
Stanley Kowalski
- characterized as crude, brutal, and insensitive.
- “red stained package”: raw meat, sex symbol, stone age, Neolithic
- Loud-colored bowling jacket: demands attention, loud just like them
- Honest and straightforward, down to earth, simple
- Mean drunk like Tennessee’s father, travels a lot
- He’s a Capricorn (goat)
Harold Mitchell
- Short-time lover of Blanche
- More sensitive than the men around him
- constant worry for his sick mother
- Momma's boy
- Very cautious and tame, clumsily follows Blanche’s dance
- Drawn to Blanche because of similar pasts of losing a loved one
Eunice Hubbell and Steve Hubbell
- Sexual relationship ebbs and flows
- Demonstrates that Stanley and Stella’s relationship will decline as soon as their sexual relationship dies down
- A foil for the relationship between Stanley and Stella
Allen Grey
- Blanche's dead husband
- The fragile to Blanche’s brute
- like with Stella
Pablo Gonzales
- Ethnic variety characteristic to New Orleans added to the poker group with his hispanic heritage and his speaking in Spanish occasionally
Young Collector
- young, innocent and reluctant to be with Blanche
- Demonstrates Blanche’s mastery of conversational tricks and foreshadows a touch of pedophilia
- Collecting money for The Evening Star
- The Evening Star is the planet Venus.
- Venus is the Roman goddess of love, beauty, fertility, and desire.
- Blanche's pursuit of the young man indicates she is in constant desire of love, and she is constantly attempting to assert her beauty and youth.
Shep Huntleigh
- Blanche’s former boyfriend who got rich from oil wells in Texas
- Used as a symbol for Blanche’s escape from the city and from Stanley
- Demonstrates Blanche’s craziness in her believing he’s present on the phone or coming
Doctor
- characterized as an old southern gentleman who can be rough and inhuman when he needs to be