Compose a 750-word paper in which you write a literary analysis of The Glass Menagerie. Feel free to use the basic APA formatted template.
Select and respond to one of questions from the list below.
1. The characters of The Glass Menagerie are limited and unable for various reasons to obtain what they desire. Select one character from the play. What does he or she desire? What prevents him or her from achieving it? How does the play resolve the conflict between desire and reality for this particular character?
2. Throughout the play, Amanda refers to Tom's hope for a life other than the one he has as selfish. Do you agree with this assessment? Does Tom's departure at the end of the play represent an unethical abandonment of his responsibilities, or a necessary choice to escape the controlling nature of his mother?
3. Audiences and critics of Williams's play have often focused on the glass menagerie and understood it to be the central symbol of the play. What is the meaning of the menagerie? How does it help us to explain and understand Laura Wingfield?