The Glass Menagerie is a story about a family of three main characters, the .
Wingfields, and their day to day struggles with each other. More specifically, it is about the struggles of .
two young adults, Laura and Tom, against their controlling mother, Amanda. Amanda's main drive in life .
seems to be her need to be supported by the efforts of others. We learn early on that Amanda's .
husband, the father of Tom and Laura, was an alcoholic who ran off without a trace years before the .
story begins. We are led to believe that Amanda's anxiety, paranoia and neediness compelled his .
actions.
.
Due to the disappearance of Mr. Wingfield, Tom, who is a poet by nature, is .
left to spend his day working in a shoe factory in order to support his mother and sister. We also start .
to see early on that his mother's behavior is affecting Tom much in the same way it affected his father. .
Tom is nearly unable to hold a conversation with his mother without her nagging driving him out of the .
house. Upon storming off he repeatedly claims to be going to the movies, and while we do not know .
this to be wholly untrue, we are led to believe that he is lying. .
.
Laura is an entirely different story in how she handles her mother's abuse. She was born .
with a slight physical disability, and while Amanda would pretend to be a supportive, her actions have .
left her daughter socially inept. One minute Amanda will claim that her daughter cannot let her disability .
keep her from experiencing life, but in the blink of an eye she will be using it to berate Laura. Because .
of this Laura's social anxiety has grown so large that she could not even attend school without getting .
nauseous.
.
In her attempts to cling onto some sort of monetary support, Amanda is forever .
bothering Tom to bring home a nice man from work to meet his sister. Amanda, under the guise of .
being supportive, continuously brags about the number of gentlemen callers she received as a young girl.
