Oppression

Callie Huber
B period

There is a clear connection between The Glass Menagerie and Native son, oppression. In Native Son, Bigger is oppressed and shunned by society for being African American, in The Glass Menagerie, Tom is an outcast of society because he is gay. Bigger and Tom are oppressed by their mothers with the heavy burden of providing a steady income for their families and both the families live in poor housing conditions, another form of society's oppression. In each story this oppression creates the characters to feel trapped, and both express a want to run away from all the responsibility and hardship. Though one story is about a man and the other a family, and both are so different in numerous ways, the bridging theme between the two writings cannot be denied. The oppression that Bigger and Tom face, though it comes in different forms, is one in the same.

In the character of Amanda in The Glass Menagerie, I also see Mrs. Dalton from Richard Wright's Native Son. Both characters believe they are helping people who need help, but never really listen to that person's side. Amanda does consider her daughter's position as a mentally disabled person, who clearly doesn't want to go to business school or try and marry a "gentleman caller". She only wishes for her daughter to blend in to the society around her, and does so by pushing for her to look as pretty as possible at all times, so that a man can come marry her after her failed attempt at getting a job. In this time period, women could either marry, or do clerical work. Since Laura already skipped her classes, Amanda wants to quickly marry her off so she doesn't have to worry about being taken care of as she grows old.
In Native Son, this same ignorance can be seen in Mrs. Dalton. Yes on the surface it seemed she wanted to help Mr. Greene, but it's clear she most likely didn't take into consideration Mr. Greene's perspective. Even if he did go to night school, his position was most likely not to improve, and the comfort he felt working for the Dalton's was surely much better than the racism he'd have to confront in the real world. Mrs. Dalton ignored that, and forced him to go to night school, believing she'd done something to help him,

Connection

My connection between Native Son and The Glass Menagerie is that in each case, the main character isn't able to reach his full potential. In Bigger's case it is his race that keeps him from getting the opportunities that he deserves. Because of this, he must resort to stealing and working at a job where he feels uncomfortable. For Tom, it is the obligation he feels towards his family that keeps him from leaving home and pursuing his dreams. His sister cannot take care of herself so he feels that he needs to provide for the family by working at a job he doesn't enjoy.

Secret Ninja Man Strikes Again! Anonymously!

At first, I was going to be glib and say that both Native Son and The Glass Menagerie were books. But then I remembered The Glass Menagerie was in fact a play. And then I remembered that I want a good grade in American Studies. So my connection is the fact that both main characters, Bigger and Tom, don’t really fit in. Bigger is a black man stuck in a white world, and therefore just wants to get away. (So naturally, throwing someone into a furnace is the appropriate reaction. (This, by the way, was not a parenthetical notation. It was simply my thoughts inside parentheses.)) Tom is a grown man, who is stuck with his obnoxious mother who is stuck in the past. His plan throughout the whole book, (I’m sorry, throughout the whole play), is to leave and go do whatever he wants, wherever he wants. Although both have this sense of being trapped, the two react to it differently. Bigger lashes out violently, such as with the rat and with Gus. Oh yeah, and Mary and Bessie. And that police officer. Tom, on the other hand, constantly expresses his disapproval, aiming his anger and frustration towards his mother. In addition to that, he finds another outlet for these feelings in movie theaters (though not the way Bigger does). He lives his dreams of being somewhere else through the heroes and adventurers in the movies, and spends most of his time there. Plus, he drinks a lot, which probably helps him as well.

Cordially,

Matthew Dever

Alana C

In Native Son Bigger is contantly trying to escape from his family and do what he wants to do. In The Glass Menagerie Tom has that deep desire to get away from his family, especially his mother, for good. They both ultimatly want a common goal, a life of freedom where no one is holding them back. Neither wants to be responcible for their mothers or siblings. In the end they both wind up doing something that finally seperates them from their families; Tom runs away and Bigger kills two people, one being a white rich female.

Cooper Swenson's Response

My connection between Native Son (NS) and The Glass Menagerie (TGM) is that the characters are both victims of oppression. In NS, Bigger Thomas is consistently made to feel self conscious in his black skinned body. He is unable to rise through society because of the tense circumstances in which he was born. For example, when he first arrives at the Dalton's household, he doesn't even know what door to enter in. In TGM, Tom, a white middle class man, even feels the harshness of oppression during the 19th century. Even though he is a fully grown man, he is unable to be successful in the world, because in the book he is being held back by his family, but in actuality his sexual preference. During this time in history, events such as McCarthyism were well underway and caused anyone who was different to either hide it or regret it. With things like this going on around them, it is no surprise that people like T. Williams suffered from addictions of many substances, including alcohol.

my account wasnt working, so i gave my answer to emily to post, but its now working

just wanted to explain the situation.


heres my post


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One connection I made between Native Son and The Glass Menagerie was how the family was structured. In The Glass Menagerie, Amanda was the only parental figure and their family depended on Tom to provide a financial income for the family and likewise with Bigger in Native Son. The interactions between Amanda and Tom were very similar between Bigger and Mrs. Thomas as well. There were constant arguments and pressure from the mothers over what went on in the lives of their sons, and how they should change them and do something more constructive instead of wasting their time.

This is Eddy Anderson`s post:

One connection I saw between The Glass Menagerie and Native Son was the use of animal symbolism. In Native son, the black rat, always scurrying around the streets and living in dirty holes, represented the black community. The White cat, majestic, all seeing, all knowing, represents the white community. In The Glass Menagerie, Laura’s glass menagerie represents her fragility, and shows her separation from the world everyone else lives in.

Both Native Son and the Glass Menagerie display a constant mood of suppression. In Native Son, Bigger and his family were suppressed their whole entire lives because of their race. Their skin color automatically disabled them from achieving what a "normal" white, American can acheive. Bigger was so suppressed his whole life by society that he generated this toxic need to disobey. For example, Bigger spent his mother's money on the movies and wanted to rob Blum's store. Then, when Bigger killed Mary he felt a strong sense of entitlement because he was given the feeling of breaking the boundary of suppression. The sad part about this situation is Bigger was never given a real chance to achieve because of his race and as a result of that he only felt power through rebellion. Tenessee Williams felt that same feeling of suppression living as a gay man, with a mentally ill sister, and a single mother in a world of social conformity. He demonstrates this feeling in his characters. Tom starts off the play getting his only joy from escaping to the movies and staring out into the fire escape with hope that one day he will walk down those steps and never return. Laura is unbearably shy and feels inferior because of her handicap. She hides herself in her world of glass animals because she feels the real world is not willing to take in her in. Amanda self-suppresses herself by living in the past. She fails to see anything as is, especially when it comes to her family. She forces the idea of gentlemen callers on Laura regardless of who Laura is as a person. She also uses Jim's arrival as a way for her to return to her southern belle past of beauty and charm. Meanwhile, Tom and Laura's father's picture hangs on the wall as a constant reminder that they will never achieve what an American family is supposed to achieve because they do not have a father like perfect society insists. At the end of the play, Tom leaves, he gives up on the life he was living. Like Bigger, Tom leaving was his way of rebelling from the life he was placed in. Both the Glass Menagerie and Native Son show that if you have differences that separate you from "normal" or "correct" idea of society, then the same idea of American Dream may not be attainable. Our society likes to give off the idea that anyone can work hard and achieve what they wish. The catch is that the term "anyone" is biased. Some people are so suppressed by their differences that they are never given a fighting chance in the same society that preaches the "equal" American Dream.

Liz Kleisner.

In both Native Son and the Glass Menagerie, the characters struggle with blindness. In Native Son, Mrs. Thomas has unrealistic expectations for her son, by getting Bigger the job with the Daltons, she's convinced her family will be able to rise above their poverty. Amanda, in the Glass Menagerie, thinks finding a husband for her daughter will be the key to rise in the world, and like Mrs. Thomas, she puts an unfair amount of pressure on her children. Neither family has a father figure, so the mothers' put all their faith in the future on their children, expecting them to solve the families problems. If Mrs. Thomas and Amanda tried to make the change for their families themselves, they might be able to achieve the American dream more successfully.
-Tarryn

The Glass Menagerie and Native Son

I completely agree with Linnea. I also think that the mother to son relationship is very similar. In the Glass Menagerie, Amanda wants Tom to do something with his life besides going to the movies every night. She wants him to not follow in his fathers foot steps and she is afraid that he might and that is the reason why she wants him to continue to work. In Native Son, Mrs.Thomas wants Bigger to get a good job that will help with her family's income. Mrs.Thomas also feels that if she doesn't push her son into striving to do good, he will end up just like his father, gone. In both books, the mothers want the best for their sons, and they will do anything to help them succeed.

The Glass Menagerie and Native Son

In both books, it is apparent that none of the characters are happy with the life they are living. For example, in Native Son, Bigger resents white people for the restrictions they place upon him. He doesn't want to be treated differently just because of his skin color. This is shown when he is admiring the plane flying through the sky, and expresses his desire to be able to fly to his friend. Also, in Native Son, the mother wishes that she could provide better for her children. She pressures Bigger to take the job at the Dalton's house, so they can have more money for food and maybe, eventually, a better place to live. In The Glass Menagerie, Amanda lives in the past. She constantly tells stories about all the "gentleman callers" and "Blue Mountain". Tom despises his workplace, and as a grown man, he doesn't seem happy about the fact that he is still living with his mother. Laura is insecure with herself, and feels that she is going to grow up alone. In both books it seems like all the characters are trying to look for an escape from themselves. For example, in The Glass Menagerie, it seems as if Amanda is trying to relive her past through her children. In Native Son, however, Bigger is trying to escape his resent of white people by working for the Dalton's, which only leads to worse things.

Jackie Krukowski

The connection that I found between The Glass Menagerie and Native Son was the relationship between the mother and son. In Native Son, Mrs. Thomas was always pushing Bigger to make sure he got a job at the Dalton's so that the rest of the family can have more income. Mrs.Dalton doesn't seem to push Vera and Buddy nearly as much, because they are younger are aren't responsible enough to handle a job yet. Similar actions were in The Glass Menagerie, between Amanda and Tom. Amanda is constantly getting on him about not going to the movies all the time, and that he is lying to her when he goes late at night. In both of these examples from each book, it shows how the mother (who are both the only parent) pressure the oldest men in the house to make sure that they are doing something well with their lives so that they don't end up like their fathers.

1.Make a connection between Native Son and The Glass Menagerie.

My connection between Native Son and The Glass Menagerie is that in both books there was no father figure and they couldn't achieve their american dream, the Thomas family and the Wingfield family. In The Glass Menagerie Amanda's american dream was to be married and to be a good mother and wife, but since there is no husband for her, her american dream is not fulfilled, Laura's american dream is to not be so shy and since her mother is always putting her down she's never going to feel good about herself, and Tom's american dream is to leave, like his father did, and to do what he wants, when he wants. In Native Son the Thomas family only lives in a one room apartment, and Bigger's dream is to also do what he wants, but it's impossible because of his family's status and his own status.

Connection

One thing I've noticed between the Glass Menagerie and Native Son is the idea of this unreachable American Dream. For the families of both Tom and Bigger are surrounded by other families achieving their goals and living it up in their societies. For the two families we examine, however, this dream seems to get further and further away with each passing week. They struggle more than their successful counterparts for food and shelter yet enjoy less privileges. For Native Son it would be easy to associate the family's struggles to their race, but in the Glass Menagerie, there are no racial issues present. The mother to son relationship is also a very prevalent connection, as it causes friction within the families and adds to the conflicts at hand.

A connection I saw between The Glass Menagerie and Native Son was that for both of the main characters Bigger and Tom and their families, the American Dream is always out of reach for them. Bigger is a black man stuck in a white society where he go anywhere, get any job he wants or go to school; he`s forced to stay in a bad situation the rest of his life. Tom is also forced to live in a terrible life with his mother and sister; he does not have the strength to walk out on them like his father did and leave behind Laura. But he does not want to spend the rest of his life in a warehouse factory, instead, he has dreams of writing poetry, much like Bigger has a dream of flying a plan one say. There is also a connection between Tom`s mother and Bigger`s they both nag on their boys to go out and find a job, so they can support the family, and they live in a run down apartment.

Connection Between Native Son and The Glass Menagerie

In both Native Son and The Glass Menagerie I believe it is apparent that the American Dream is not attainable for everybody. In Native Son, the Thomas family has everything working against them: they are black, they are poor, Bigger was accused of murder of a white girl, and similar to The Glass Menagerie the Thomas children had no father figure; essentially, the Thomas family did not fit what was desired and therefore could not reach the American Dream. Additionally, Bigger Thomas let society's biases of the color of his skin hinder his potential. In The Glass Menagerie, the Wingfield family has the pressure of society on them as well. They don't fit the picture of social conformity because they live in a poor tenement, Laura is disabled, and they don't have a father figure. Because of this, they are unable to reach the American Dream. After reading these two works of literature, I don't think it is possible for just anybody to reach the American Dream, and I believe social conformity plays a large role in this as well. If you are not "normal" by society's standards then you will not be able to progress towards the American Dream, and ultimately be successful.