The Glass Menagerie

The play The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams is one of the more entertaining works that we have been presented with in AP Literature. While the family was absolutely bizarre, the story seemed to have natural elements of a broken family. There was a missing father, but he impacted the story greatly. More than any other person in the actual story did, actually. The father was a symbol of ambition for Tom and a sign of regret for Amanda. Tom wanted to be just like his father, to be able to get away. Tom wanted to travel, to leave and see the world. "I'm like my father. The bastard son of a bastard! See how he grins? And he's been absent going on sixteen years!" (Perrine, 1269). Tom at this point is talking to Jim and telling him all about how he has great dreams and plans of leaving the South. Amanda always refers to him and her disappointment in having married him. She speaks of him as if she regrets ever being with him. "All of my gentlemen callers were sons of planters and so of course I assumed that I would be married to one and raise my family on a large piece of land with plenty of servants. But man proposes and women accepts the proposal -to car that old, old saying a little bit- I married no planter! I married a man who worked for the telephone company" (Perrine, 1270). Amanda wanted the best like she could have and for her, that would be a life of riches, material things, and no absent husband.