A Streetcar Named Desire

A Streetcar Named Desire

Scene Nine

1. robe — dressing-gown or housecoat.
2. Y'know — you know.
3. uncavalier — not the behaviour of a gentleman, unchivalrous.
4. offers him her lips — holds up her face to him to be kissed on the lips.
5. a cold shoulder — unfriendly and unresponsive behaviour.
6. apparel — clothes. She is using old-fashioned language as an affectation.
7. polka — a fast, lively dance.
8. you dumb angel-puss — you stupid but good-looking man (patronisingly colloquial).
9. cross-examine the witness — ask searching questions as a lawyer might in court.
10. boxed out of your mind — too drunk to think clearly.
11. Southern Comfort — a whisky-based drink.
12. lapping it up — drinking it greedily.
13. at the plant — at the factory.
14. that pitch — that story, idea put forward.
15. malarky — nonsense.
16. dished out — given to him (colloquial).
17. you was straight — you were honest (colloquial).
18. put him in his place — showed him that he was inferior to me.
19. Rub-a-dub . . . tub — the beginning of an old English nursery rhyme.
20. Tarantula — the name of a large, dangerous, tropical spider.
21. intimacies — sexual relationships.
22. played out — exhausted, unable to continue.
23. gone up the water-spout — disappeared suddenly, as if sucked up by a whirlwind.
24. Flores para los muertos — flowers for the dead.
25. Corones para les muertos — coronets for the dead.
26. the paddywagon — police van for taking those arrested off to jail.
27. clean enough — respectable enough.

Scene Ten

1. soiled — stained, not clean.
2. crumpled — froissé.  
3. scuffed — scraped and marked.
4. spectral — ghostly.
5. the glass cracks — this is traditionally an omen of impending misfortune or disaster.
6. honky-tonky — relating to a cheap noisy ball.
7. a little shut-eye — some sleep (colloquial).
8. Yep — yes (colloquial).
9. fine feathers —fancy clothes.
10. a bolt from the blue — a thunderbolt out of a clear blue sky, utterly unexpected.
11. beau — admirer.
12. ATO — Auxiliary Territorial Officer.
13. relic — something left from the past, particularly a memento of someone dead.
14. Tiffany — an expensive and well-known jeweller's in New York.
15. Dallas — a large town in Texas, a centre for the American petroleum industry.
16. gold spouts out of the ground — where there are profitable oil wells.
17. sneak out of — leave in a secretive and ashamed manner.
18. geyser  —  a forceful jet of liquid.
19. bury the hatchet — stop quarrelling.
20. loving-cup — a pledge of friendship.
21. a red-letter night — a memorable, significant time, with something to celebrate.
22. You having . . . me having ... — Stanley uses 'having' in different ways: for Blanche the 'having' has a sexual connotation as well as meaning 'possessing'; for Stanley it means 'giving birth to', or his wife doing so.
23. break out — take out of its wrappings.
24. put on the dog — dress up specially.
25. casting my pearls before swine — a Biblical expression meaning wasting words of wisdom on someone incapable of appreciating them (swine = pig or rough person).
26. walking papers — orders to leave.
27. Mardi Gras outfit — a carnival costume of the sort worn at Mardi Gras celebrations on the day before the beginning of Lent, the Christian period of self-denial.
28. rag-picker — collector and seller of rags (= torn old clothing) and old clothes.
29. been on to you — seen through your pretence.
30. pull any wool.. . eyes — treat this man like a fool, deceive him.
31. Egypt... Queen of the Nile — as if she were Cleopatra.
32. jiggles the hook — tries to alert the operator by moving the telephone receiver-rest up and down.
33. rolled a drunkard — robbed a drunk while he was asleep.
34. lurid — frightening.
35. rooting — searching about in.
36. sequined — à paillettes (cheap).
37. Western Union — an American telephone company.
38. left th' phone off th' hook — did not replace the telephone receiver properly.
39. interfere with — make sexual advances.
40. putting on — what new act are you trying?
41. rough-house — physical violence, fighting.
42. this date — generally a romantic meeting arranged between two people.

Scene 9 analysis

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