Tennessee_Williams

Tennessee Williams Tennessee Williams, born as Thomas Lanier Williams on March 26, 1911 was born as a outcast to society. With his mother a southern girl obsessed with her Southern hospitality, and his father, a traveling shoe's salesmen. Williams was born to write about society outcasts. Williams had two siblings, Rose who was diagnosed with schizophrenia and lobotomized and then institutionalized for the rest of her life. His younger brother Dakin Williams was favored above the rest of his children. His grandfather is where Williams spent most of the time, but he was very stern. (Haley 1). Williams was always looking for times to write, in fact he dropped out of his first college the University of Missouri because he didn't have enough opportunities to write. After dropping out of college he worked for his father's shoe company, elevator operator and theatre usher, all while continuing to write. His finally went back to college to learn playwright and graduated from the University of Iowa in 1938. He adopted his college nickname Tennessee Williams to write his plays and short stories with. Williams was a homosexual, and his partner Frank Merbo died of cancer in 1961. As a result Williams moved around in predominately gay societies, such as New Orleans, Key West, New York City and Princeton. Williams was said to be always moving and wandering around. Williams battled with alcoholism, drug abuse and mental illness. Ht feared that he might go insane sometimes, because of his sister Rose's condition. When Williams died, his death was gruesome. He choked on a bottle cap at the Elysee Hotel while coincidentally, Blanche DuBois in "A Street Car Named Desire" died in an apartment building called Elysian Fields. His location of death was appropriate for him because it's the "traditional bivouac of wanderers and outcasts" (Haley 2). Which in all respects Williams was both. He was buried in St. Louis in a Catholic ceremony at his brother, Dankin's, request. Williams first play "Battle of Angels" (later renamed Orpheus Descending), closed in 1940 because of poor reviews and censorship controversy. In 1945 he completed "The Glass Menagerie" and opened on Broadway. "The Glass Menagerie" is probably his most famous play, which won "the New York Critics Circle, Donaldson, and Sidney Howard Memorial awards. Williams stressed that all of his major plays fit in the "memory play" format he described in his production notes for "The Glass Menagerie" In Williams' lifetime he accumulated four New York Drama Critics Awards; three Donaldson Awards; a Tony Award for "The Rose Tattoo''; a New York Film Critics Award for "A Streetcar Named Desire"; the Brandeis University Creative Arts Away; a Medal of Honor from the National Arts Club; $11,000 Commonwealth Award; and an honorary doctorate from Harvard University. Many famous actors have starred in his plays, some critics like to think that the only reason that these actors and actresses are famous is because of his playwrights. Whether that is true or false, the fact still lies that Williams made more of an impact on the development of American cinema than any other playwright in the twentieth century.