In Tennessee William's the Glass Menagerie the Wingfield family- that belongs in the lower middle class- Amanda and her two children, Laura and Tom live in a small apartment somewhere St. Louis. These three main characters live between reality and their own world of illusion in order to escape from their every day problems. The Glass Menagerie is a memory play. More specifically, it is Tom's memories about his family a few years later while he far away from them. The playwright succeeds in creating the memory dimensions through the use of the setting, the characters and some symbols. .
Firstly, the setting is used in such way by Tennessee Williams in order to add a non-realistic memory atmosphere in the play. In particular, the colours that are used in the setting are dark and dim, in order to give this non-realistic impression to the audience of the play. As the playwright mentions in his stage directions the interior of Wingfield's small apartment " Is therefore rather dim and poetic". The same "foggy" atmosphere applies to the rest of the setting as well. "The building, which runs parallel.by dark, narrow alleys which run- In addition, there is intentional omitting of some details of the setting and exaggeration of others, exactly because it is a memory play, and as Tennessee Williams notes "memory takes all lot of poetic licence." For example " The alleys are actually in darkness, and the objects just mentioned not visible." On the other hand, some parts of the setting are exaggerated like the huge photograph on the wall, which is supposed to be the portrait of the father who has left the family a long time ago." A blown up photograph of the father hangs on the wall- .
Furthermore, some other part of the setting as well as the lighting effects and the music as handled by the playwright, add to the memory dimensions of the play. Like the transparent exterior fourth wall, which comes into use in the first and in the last scene, when Tom starts and ends the narration of his memory.