Abstract
This paper starts the research reading the hesitations of literary and theatrical criticism in its proposition to classify Tennessee Williams’s (1911-1983) dramatic writing, especially the critics who try to restrict the playwright's works under the term “Realism”. Adverse to this criticism, the production notes from The Glass Menagerie (1944) - Williams’s Plastic Theatre manifesto - reveal the author's intentions to get rid of orthodox Realism theatre conventions in his plays. Finally, the study points in Williams’s The Mutilated (1967) some remarkable qualities - expressionist techniques and uses of brechtian Verfremdungseffekt - that allude to a distinct conception of Realism.
Keywords:
Tennessee Williams; Realism; Plastic Theatre; Expressionism; Verfremdungseffekt