denly rapes her. Though all this time Blanche sought a smooth and new sexual lifestyle, she once again engages in a sexual deviance. These three things are what make Aristotle’s tragic agent a truth in Tennessee Williams’ play.As if Blanche DuBois hadn’t embodied enough of one’s idea of a tragic agent, Arthur Schopenhauer finds more qualities in her that further the inclination that she was meant for tragedy. Schopenhauer alludes to two main ideas that Blanche applies to. The first being that of desire. Desire brought Blanche to Elysian Fields in two ways: literally on a streetcar named Desire, and conceptually as an escape from past horrors and the want to seek a better life. Desire is the one vice that Schopenhauer believes is the end-all be-all destruction of an agent. As long as one continues to have desires, that agent will continue down his or her path of inevitable destruction. Which brings him to the next point: Resignation. Resignation is the act of “cutting off” all desires one might have. It is a final action one completes when they completely cleanse themselves of their greedy desires. Blanche does this in her last line, “Whoever you are – I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.” In the last scene, Blanche has continued to fool herself and attempt to fool others by telling stories of Shep Huntleigh coming to take her on a cruise. She obviously has not resigned the fact that she has nowhere to go, and her desire to establish a new reputation has not disappeared. When she sees the doctor’s, she is persistent and refuses to go. It is only when the doctor begins to walk her away from the home that she says her famous line, and thus resigns from her previous vices. Many think that a resignation speech must have great lengthy and wordiness to it, but in this case, it is summed up concisely. In Arthur Miller’s opinion, Blanche DuBois was just as suscepti...
