Pryor, William L.2022-12-132022-12-13197113997204https://hdl.handle.net/10657/12897The purpose of this thesis is to point out Williams' temporal preoccupations and to demonstrate the effects of this obsession on his art. He views these temporal elements as forces which influence the action, pattern of characterization, and philosophy of his plays. Like other writers of the Southern Renaissance, Williams is concerned with the importance of the past and of time and with the ways in which these elements affect human lives. He employs two types of past, the historical and the personal, both being powerful determinants of thought and action in the present. He emphasizes the past through his settings, thematic music, characterization, and through his use of myth, juxtaposition,, and symbology in such plays as The Glass Menagerie, A Streetcar Named Desire, and Summer and Smoke. But his attitude toward the past is ambivalent, and he makes no definite moral judgment of the representatives of the past in his plays. [...]application/pdfenThis item is protected by copyright but is made available here under a claim of fair use (17 U.S.C. Section 107) for non-profit research and educational purposes. Users of this work assume the responsibility for determining copyright status prior to reusing, publishing, or reproducing this item for purposes other than what is allowed by fair use or other copyright exemptions. Any reuse of this item in excess of fair use or other copyright exemptions requires express permission of the copyright holder.Williams, Tennessee, 1911-1983Criticism and interpretationThesisreformatted digital