You’re alternate Reality

 

A person’s perception of reality depends on the way they see the world. What they see can differ from what others believe is true. Sometimes an individual can lose their grasp of what is real and what is merely an illusion. In the play “A Streetcar Named Desire” Blanche’s character lives in a dream world, and she uses illusion, false appearances to deceive others. The movie “Shutter Island” directed by Martin Scorsese has the same type of character with Teddy Daniels. Like Blanche, Edward creates an illusion to hide from the real problems his is dealing with. This façade that both characters create eventually leads to their downfall. The significance of having to create an illusion is ironic because this leads to a thin line between what is real and what is fantasy.

Early on Blanche starts to show little glimpses of her true self in the beginning of the play. After Blanche arrives at her sister’s house, she is a nervous state. It shows her wanting a drink right away, Blanche uses alcohol to drown her sorrows. “No Coke, honey not with my nerves tonight!”(Tennessee Williams’s pg. 1169) Next Blanche tries to cover up her drinking problem, by denying it and making excuses. “Blanche: Just water, to chase it! Now don’t get worried, your sister hasn’t turned into a drunkard, she just all shaken up and hot and tired and dirty!”(Tennessee Williams’s pg. 1169) Stella offers Blanche another drink and she refuses it, but in reality she wants another. “Stella: Won’t you have another? Blanche: No, one’s my limit. Stella: Sure?”(Tennessee Williams’s pg. 1170) Stella knows her sister is hiding her obsession with alcohol. This creates her illusion of being a good old fashioned girl with no problems and nothing to hide.

The light is another thing she hides from, the dark is more pleasant to her. She also uses fancy clothes to create a life style she no longer lives. “Blanche: You haven’t said anything about my appearance. Stella: You look just fine. Blanche: God love you for a liar! Daylight never exposed so total a ruin! But you- you’ve put on some weight, yes, you’re just as plump as a little partridge! And it’s so becoming of you!”(Tennessee Williams’s pg. 1170) As you see Blanche insults her sister’s appearance and this is a sign she is insincere about her own looks. This is her way of coping with her false appearance by pointing out other peoples flaws. “Blanche: Well-anyhow- I bought nice clothes and I’ll wear them. I guess you’re hoping I say I’ll put up a hotel, but I’m not going to put at a hotel. I want to be near you, got to be with somebody, I can’t be alone! Because- as you must noticed- I’m- not very well.”(Tennessee Williams’s pg. 1171) Blanche is in desperate need of belonging and she needs to dress extremely well to impress her next romantic encounter. She needs someone else to deceive so she can go on living a lie and fulfilling her fantasy.

In “Stutter Island” Teddy Daniels is the fantasy Andrew Laeddeis creates to escape the truth of what really happened to him. Andrew is a former federal marshal from Boston, he is institutionalized in Ashecliffe a mental hospital for the criminally insane for killing his wife Dolores. Andrew has been a patient at Ashecliffe for two years and he hasn’t made much progress towards rehabilitation. Every time Andrew makes a breakthrough it on lasts a short while, he later on relapses and falls victim to his own delusions. Before his current state in the movie, Andrew realized who he really was, this was nine months prior to the events that took place.

Teddy Daniels is his other personality that Andrew creates to cope with his wife murdering his three children and also his guilt of killing Dolores. Andrew in reality wishes he arrived from work sooner that day to stop his wife from drowning their three children. He also knew Dolores was losing her sense of purpose and her mind moving closer to insanity. Andrew ignored all of the signs and this lead to great tragedy. Teddy Daniels is a piece of his former self when Andrew was a marshal. Teddy is investigating the disappearance of a patient named Rachel Salando and he thinks Chuck is his partner aiding with the search. Chuck is really his psychologist Dr. Lester Sheehan and he is going along with his false persona to help guide Andrew back to reality. Dr. John Cawley is the head doctor of the facility and he is letting Andrew conduct this fake investigation in order to find the truth in his real self. Andrew is completely delusional and his still thinks his is a real federal marshal, so Teddy is his coping mechanism. When his searches the cell of Rachel Salando he finds a loose floor board behind the bed and under that he finds a piece of paper. Written on this paper is, “the law of 4, who is 67?” (Martin Scorsese) He eventually is told what this paper really means by Dr. Cawley.

As Teddy Daniels, he is given the run of the facility to uncover his theories of the doctors undergoing experiments on patients to create ghosts from altering the brain. Teddy also believes Laeddeis is the perpetrator who burned down his apartment with his wife Dolores dying from the crime. The actual event that took place was Dolores burning down the apartment where they first lived, this was her way of escaping the suburbs. This was in order to be secluded by moving to the country, by doing this Dolores feel more out of touch with her sanity. So as Teddy he believes the real reason he was sent to Ashecliffe to find Laeddeis and kill him.

This game that Andrew creates to find the patient Rachel Salando is his way of remembering why he is really on Shutter Island.  Eventually Teddy realizes he is Andrew after the scene in the lighthouse where Chuck reveals that he is Dr. Sheehan. Dr. Cawley also tells Teddy he is actually Andrew Laeddeis and Dolores Chanal is his wife. Rachel Salando and Teddy Daniels are the anagrams of their names, which is the law of four. The law of four, who is 67, is what Andrew has been trying to figure out during his investigation. Andrew is patient 67 and this eventually set off some light bulbs in his head.

The next morning Andrew wakes up with Doctors Sheehan and Cawley standing over his bed. They asked who he is, why he was there and who his wife is. The doctors also asked if he was really back to his true self and not his false appearance teddy. He admitted that he was Andrew Laeddeis, and he killed his wife Dolores. He killed her because she drowned his three children and he created Teddy to forget about his real life problems. The following day he has another relapse and his calls Dr. Sheehan his partner named Chuck. Then he asks what they are going to do next, which leads to Dr. Sheehan head motioning to Dr. Cawley that nothing has changed. After this Andrew is lead away from Dr. Sheehan by the orderly’s and Dr. Cawley to be given a lobotomy.

Blanche has similar characteristics to Teddy but on a smaller scale. Blanche needs someone to escape with so she is trying to convince Stella to leave Stanley. This is hear way of running away from her problems and living with her fantasy. “Blanche: I have a plan for both of us, to get us both-out! You take it for granted that I am in something that I want to get out of.”(Tennessee Williams’s pg. 1197) Stella couldn’t deal with Blanche anymore. “Stella: I couldn’t believe her story and go on living with Stanley.”(Tennessee Williams’s pg. 1232) In the next page she takes about the millionaire from Dallas who doesn’t really exist. She created this person to show she is wanted, but in reality she is all alone.

Stanley finds out from a good source that Blanche is not who she really is and that she was fired from her job in laurel because she slept with a student. This leads to Mitch leaving Blanche and this eventually makes her lose her full sense of hope and reality. Mitch wonders why Blanche never wants to go out in the afternoon, this is because the light is the truth and darkness is her way of hiding, by creating the illusion of glamorous façade. “Mitch: It is dark in here. Blanche: I like the dark. The dark is comforting to me.”(Tennessee Williams’s pg. 1223)

In both situations Blanche and Teddy dealt with their fantasies in a different way but they both ended up in separation from the others. Blanche ended up in the mental hospital and Andrew was given a lobotomy to end his torment. The theme of fantasy or reality was portrayed is these works of literature. Blanche and Andrew created these fantasies to cope with their true selves. What would you do in these situations, I leave that to imagination?