Why Are Tennessee Williams' Plays So Painful? | Biographical Documentary

Video Description

Tennessee Williams is one of the greatest writers of the 20th century. His plays – The Glass Menagerie, A Streetcar Named Desire, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof – are not just classics of the American stage - they are deeply probing but poetic explorations of the human heart in conflict with itself. His characters have become part of our cultural identity: the fragile Laura Wingfield, the desperate Blanche DuBois, the brutish Kowalski - souls clinging to dignity in a world that seeks to crush them, figures haunted by memory and driven by desires they can barely name. His plays shocked audiences when they were first presented, as they explored themes of violence, complex relationship issues and mental illness. The immense sensitivity required to create such characters came from a lifetime of battling his own private demons: a turbulent family life, deep-seated anxiety, the trauma of his sister’s admission to a mental hospital and his struggle with alcohol. In this biographical documentary, Professor Graeme Yorston, explores the brilliant but tormented life of Tennessee Williams from his perspective as a psychiatrist. To understand how Tennessee Williams transformed his profound personal pain into some of the most powerful and enduring writing in world literature. Finding Out More Tennessee Williams published his own very candid memoirs in 1975 and there are two recent biographies that cover the first and second halves of his life, Tom by Lyle Leverich and Tennessee Williams: The Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh by John Lahr. I’ve added these to my Amazon Store Page. https://www.amazon.com/shop/professorgraemeyorston Academic References Jeste, N. D., Palmer, B. W., & Jeste, D. V. (2004). Tennessee Williams. The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 12(4), 370-375. Mandelbaum, G. (2017). Two psychotic playwrights at work: the late plays of August Strindberg and Tennessee Williams. The Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 86(1), 149-182. Paller, M. (2000). The Couch and Tennessee. The Tennessee Williams Annual Review, (3). Copyright Disclaimer The primary purpose of this video is educational. I have tried to use material in the public domain or with Creative Commons Non-attribution licences wherever possible. Where attribution is required, I have listed this below. I believe that any copyright material used falls under the remit of Fair Use, but if any content owners would like to dispute this, I will not hesitate to immediately remove that content. It is not my intention to infringe on content ownership in any way. If you happen to find your art or images in the video, please let me know and I will be glad to credit you. Images Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons Internet Archive The Wellcome Collection Library of Congress Music Riding The Rails Created with Udio beta, prompt "riding the rails" bluegrass/blues/folk tags, intro, track extension and outro added. Pie Plant Pete performs the song Hand Me Down My Walking Cane PD Livery Stable Blues -The Original Dixieland Jass Band (1917) PD Porch Blues Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ The Colonel - Zaccharia Hickman CC0 Anything you can dream - The Whole Other CCO Blue Creek Trail -Dan Lebowitz CC0 Coming Home- Dan Lebowitz CC0 One down dog - Wes Hutchinson Plantation by Audionautix is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Artist: http://audionautix.com/ Cooper Cannell Amazing Grace CC0 Forest Lullaby - Asher Fulero CCO Vespers on the Shore - Mini Vandals CC0 Lobe - Mini Vandals CC0 No 2 Remembering Her - Esther Abrami CC0 City Walk - John Pattucci CC0 Wish you’d never left - Track Tribe CC0 The Mood Drops - Nathan Moore CC0 Blue Mood Robert - Munzinger CC0 Gridlock - John Pattucci CC0 Jane Street - Track Tribe CC0 Black Terrier Blues - CC0 Tacklebox Blues - CC0 Hon Kyoku - Doung Maxwell/Zac Zinger CC0 Calm Cam - Track Tribe CC0 Gershwin: 3 Preludes for Clarinet and Piano II. Clarinet: Byeon Gyu-ri, Piano: Kim Hwa-jeong CCAttribution MusicLFiles - The Lament Of The Warfields CC4.0 Balada Gitana - House of the Gypsies CC0 Lonely Man - Alex Hamlin CC0 Swing Haven - St Louis Reed Mathis CC0 Backwards BBQ - Chris Haugen CC0 Empty Bottle empty bed - Mini Vandals CC0 Only Farwell - Dan Lebowitz CC0 Traverse the Sky - Asher Fulero CC0 Misha Dioxin- From the Arctic Circle - To the southern seas CC4.0 Video edited by Manavi Sakunika and produced by Graeme Yorston and Tom Yorston