Glass Menagerie is a play that originated in the memory of the author, Tennessee Williams. He draws heavily on his own family experiences, describing the lives of his mother, sister and himself. This play centers on a dysfunctional family with three members.
1 Family Members.
Amanda Winfield, the mother. A little woman of great but confused vitality clinging frantically to another time and place. Her characterization must be carefully created, not copied from type. She is not paranoiac, but her life is paranoia. There is much to admire in Amanda, and as much to love and pity as there is to laugh at. Certainly she has endurance and a kind of heroism, and though her foolishness makes her unwittingly cruel at times, there is tenderness in her slight person.
Laura Winfield, her daughter. Amanda, having failed to establish contact with reality, continues to live vitally in her illusions, but Laura's situation is even graver. A childhood illness has left her crippled, one leg slightly shorter than the other, and held in a brace. This defect need not be more than suggested on the stage. Stemming from this, Laura's separation increases till she is like a piece of her own glass collection, too, exquisitely fragile to move from the shelf.
Tom Winfield, her son. And the narrator of the play. A poet with a job in a warehouse. His nature is not remorseless, but to escape from a trap she has to act without pity.
Actually, there's a fourth member in this family who never appears throughout this play, that's Amanda's husband. " a telephone man who falls in love with long distance". He lefts this family, leaving only a laughing picture. Such an irresponsible act lefts a permanent scar inflicting his wife and children. And also it has a big influence on the mother-children relationship this family.
2 Mother-Children Relationship.
(1) unnatural: every member has their own world of illusion.
This unnatural relationship is made possible by the fact that each of the three has their own world of illusion.