The Aesthetics of Blue and Its Bestiality in Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar Named Desire

This paper delves into the aesthetic impact of blue in Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar Named Desire, with a particular focus on its association with bestiality. Drawing on Goethe’s Theory of Colors along with Christian Dior’s “Sauvage” Blue perfume advertisement, this study argues that the inherent bestiality of blue manifests as an inexorable force that ensnares Blanche, who is dressed in white, leading to her eventual downfall. Blue is referenced 29 times in the play, notably in depictions of the sky during the blue hour, memory, blues music, and men’s blue workwear, as well as concepts of the future, fantasies, Dela Robbia blue, and an ideal land. Characterized as “the color of distance,” blue possesses a dual nature, embodying both wild, savage, primitive, bestial aspects alongside sacred and sublime qualities. While the aesthetic significance of “blue piano” has traditionally been studied within Elias Kazan’s framework as “an expression of loneliness and rejection,” this paper posits that the “blue piano,” resonating through the turquoise sky during the blue hour, serves as a conduit for expressing “the spirit of the life” unfolding in the “jungle” of New Orleans. The blue in the “blue piano” symbolizes bestiality in that it transforms Elysian Fields into a jungle resonating with “inhuman sounds,” which traps Blanche and leads to her exile. Ultimately, this paper contends that blue functions as an aesthetic tool for illustrating “the ravishment of the tender, the sensitive, the delicate by the savage and brutal forces” in modern society.