Comparison Of A Street Car Named Desire And The Piano Lesson

As years go by in American history many things come, go, and change in people, but one that which never seems to flee the spirit is the so called "American Dream". The idea that something greater exists for everyone becomes an obsession for most, and lives are formed around it. This being true in real life, there would be no hesitation to put it forth through literature. More often than not it is portrayed through someone, a character, striving to achieve that which the rest of the country hold so dear. They search for a way out of their sad disposition, into a new light. Along the way, many things help guide them to their destination, some representing what they yearn for more than others. In the plays "A Streetcar Named Desire" by Tennessee Williams and "The Piano Lesson" by August Wilson, the American Dream is found within the soul of two inanimate objects; the DuBois's Belle Reve and the Charles's old piano.

Belle Reve is a special place near and dear to the hearts of the children who grew up there, Blanche DuBois and Stella Kowalski. In the country, the home sheltered the girls and their white family for years, but became too much for the dwindling family to bear. Williams's play "A Streetcar Named Desire" takes place in the city of New Orleans, where Stella has created a new life for herself, away from the past and Belle Reve. When her sister Blanche comes to stay with her for a while, she carries along with her the news that their precious Belle Reve has been lost, and she unable to stop it from occurring by only herself. In being forced to leave behind all that she knew but still keep the dreadful memories of the deaths of loved ones she endured, Blanche seems to fall apart. Her sister has already made a new life for herself with a husband and a baby on the way, but without Belle Reve Blanche is left without her lineage and her money to try to forge her way into the world once more. It appears that with the loss of Belle Reve came the loss of her American Dream.

Wilson creates a different sort of object, not a home that shelters, but a piano. Into this piano he instills a statement for the black family whose possession it is in. In the middle of Bernice Charles's parlor it sits, unmoved and wooden. How it came to be there is a story which her uncle Doaker tells well. Her father Willie Boy used to work as a slave under the ownership of Mr. Sutter. He was an amazing wood crafter and continued to bring cash in for his "superior". But Willie Boy didn't always belong to Sutter, instead he used to belong to a certain Nolander, whose wife owned the very piano that he was traded to Mr. Sutter for. When Mrs. Nolander wanted to buy him back as her slave, the new owner refused. Instead he allowed Willie Boy to take his talents into their house and carve a picture into the wood of their piano. He was only supposed to carve himself and Mama Bernice, but instead continued to carve pictures of his whole family that he stored in his memory. After the piano was finished Boy Charles, Willie Boy's father, felt that he should take the piano because he would "say it was the story of [their] whole family and as long as Sutter had it...he had [them]"(Wilson 45). On the fourth of July in 1911, it was done. But sadly, Boy Charles was killed, hiding in a box car afterwards. After his death, Bernice's mother broke down and brought in a woman to teach Bernice how to play. She said that when Bernice played she could hear her father talk to her, and so Bernice continued to play, until her mother's death. Now she won't touch the piano, yet refuses to part with it. For her, the piano has become sacred, but to her brother Boy Willie, it has become a one way ticket out of the rut of a life he's been working. The two of them fight back and forth for the piano, neither willing to listen to the other, but her brother refuses to let it go no matter what argument Bernice places at his feet. For Boy Willie, selling that piano, which he considers half his, is the key to his success and the door to his American Dream, and he's not willing to let it go.

Both authors have created two very unique objects to focus their stories around, and have done so well. The piano from "The Piano Lesson" and Belle Reve from "A Streetcar Named Desire" are both made into images that relate to a sort of wealth. Blanche panics after Bell Reve is taken away because that was all she had to depend on for money. Without it she ends up worse off than her sister. The piano on the other hand, doesn't represent something to be lost, but something to be given, something to be given for a price. Willie Boy plans on selling the piano so he can buy himself Sutter's land and start a living that way, which leads to one very big difference. The wooden piano tends to represent a sense of pride for the family, yet Bernice, the one who should emanate it the most, won't even tell her daughter about it as if she's ashamed. Boy Willie on the other hand feels that his father would have wanted him to take

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