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Tennessee Williams (1911-1983)

Thomas Lanier Williams was born in Columbus, Missouri, the grandson of an Episcopal clergyman and the son of a travelling salesman. The family moved to St.

Louis, but he could not settle down to city life, and he chose the name 'Tennessee' to celebrate the Deep South where most of his plays are set. In 1938 he entered the University of Iowa, and in 1940 received a Rockefeller Fellowship for Battle of Angels, later rewritten as Orpheus Descending (1957), the first of the many plays, stories and poems Williams was to publish.

Williams was awarded Pulitzer Prizes in 1948 and 1955.

Williams did not attempt to reproduce everyday reality on the stage, but was thoroughly theatrical in his approach. When he envisaged a play he saw not only his characters in his plot, but also his actors in his stage-set, under his lights and with a background soundtrack of his devising.

In conversation with J. Devlin [1] Williams said he was