A Lady's Beaded Bag Analysis

Bystrova Elizaveta, 2la

“A Lady’s Beaded Bag” Analysis

Tennessee Williams is widely regarded as one of the greatest playwrights in the American history. He is fairly considered one of the three foremost playwrights in 20th-century American drama. Beside plays he also wrote short stories, poetry, essays and memoirs. “A Lady’s Beaded Bag”, one of Williams’s earliest works of fiction, was written when Tennessee Williams was a first-year student at the University of Missouri and was firstly published in 1930.

The plot of the story “A Lady’s Beaded Bag” is centered around one November evening from the life of the main character – trash-picker, who accidentally discovers a splendid lady’s beaded bag in a dumpster. All of these fifteen years he was seeking for something valuable among the trash and finally he got one chance in a million. But as he was walking to the end of the alley, seeing a chauffeur standing guard, trash-picker began to hesitate and wonder what the authorities would do if they found the beaded bag in his possession. Therefore, he brought ‘the treasure’ to the owner who later proclaimed the item ridiculous and threw it onto the bed as if it were a rag. Thus there is no wonder that the main conflict of the story is the inner conflict of the poor beggar who feels guilty for finding the beaded bag and struggles whether to return it or not . The climax of the conflict takes place at the very moment when the most valuable thing for the trash-picker appears to be just ‘ridiculous item’ for Mrs. Ferrabye.

Hence the main idea of the story is the enormous gulf between the rich and the poor and the question of morality. The trash-picker finds the bag and returns it out of the fear to be called a thief, although it is clearly his ticket out of poverty. He upholds moral order, whereas Mrs. Ferrabye is indifferent about the luxuries she possesses.

As for the characters represented in the story, there are two main heroes – the trash-picker and Mrs. Ferrabye. As for the first main character, he is street dweller whose imagination whirls as his daily routine has been finally paid off. Although he was hoping to find among the trash something of great worth for long fifteen years he can’t withstand his own conscience and takes back the purse to the nearest mansion. This deed reveals the true nature of the dweller – fearful, but still scrupulous person. The second main character - Mrs. Ferrabye – is a wealthy aristocrat who owns so many priceless possessions that she does not even pay attention to the loss of the one of them. Her character is a perfect image of the typical representative of the rich. As soon as the Mrs. Ferrabye’s character is introduced the trash-picker is forgotten. He is not rewarded for the right thing he’s done and is left to continue his rummaging through rubbish, while Mrs. Ferrabye’s becomes richer and richer with very tiny effort.