sad

When Stella was in the hospital, preparing to have her baby the next morning, Stanley raped Blanche. He did this because he could not stand her, and wanted to harm her greatly. Blanche was hurt so much by this that she told Stella, who in turn protected Stanley and did not believe her. Stella loved the comfort and security of having Stanley around. She would always fall for it when he would apologize for yelling or beating her. She was a sucker. So she didn't believe that Stanley would do such a thing because she believed Stanley was inherently good. Stella thought that Blanche was crazy, and tricked her into going to a mental hospital. Stella thought that Blanche had ruined her and Stanley's relationship, and she wanted it to go "back to the old way." Blanche also would do many weird things. First, she just in general acted weird. She would talk about hearing music, always take baths, and she would always talk badly about Stanley. Blanche also had had a relationship with a 17 year old and had lied about her past. Blanch had slept around with other men at Hotel Flamingo and then acted as if she was "old fashioned," to Stella, Stanley, and Mitch. She completely lied about her recent past to everyone. Blanche only believed in telling people what she wanted to be true, instead of reality, just like characters in Sunset Boulevard and in The Death of a Salesman. I think that Blanche's "tape recorder" was Stanley when he exposed Blanche's past. 

I think that in the end, sending Blanche to a mental hospital was absolutely the right thing to do because she was flat out crazy. She had been raped, dumped by Mitch, lost her job, lost her husband, kicked out of a town and a sleezy hotel, and just did not have much of a happy life. Everything added up in the end, and she cracked. I wish, though, that Stella had believed that Stanley had raped her because maybe this time Stella would have gathered up the courage to leave Stanley. Stanley had been such an awful husband.