Illusions of Escape in the Glass Menagerie Tennessee Williams' comedy The Glass Menagerie gives readers a glimpse into a truly dysfunctional family. At first it may seem that their lives are anything but normal, but "Amanda's drive to preserve her single-parent family seems as familiar as the morning paper" (Presley 53). The Wingfields are a typical family struggling to get by. Their problems, however, stem from their inability to communicate effectively with each other. Instead of expressing their differences, they resort to desperate acts. The desperation embraced by the Wingfields led them to create illusions in their minds and become deceptive. Amanda, Tom, and Laura are trapped in a web of desperation, denial, and deception, and it is this entanglement that prevents them, as it would any family, from living a productive, emotionally fulfilling life together. Amanda Wingfield's life didn't end the way she wanted. She states, “I was not prepared for what the future brought me” (Williams 720). According to Delma E. Presley, “If Amanda appears desperate, she certainly has a legitimate reason” (37). First of all, she has a daughter, Laura, who depends on her for everything. He is afraid that Laura will end up being a “little bird-like [woman] without any crust of nest-eating humility” for the rest of her life (Williams 700). It also has a...... half of an article ......ee Literature 34.3 (Summer 1998): 250-272. ProQuest. Jacobs Library, Oglesby, IL. July 11, 2000. .Jolemore, Nancy. “Lesson notes and study guide questions for The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee William.” Old Dominion University. January 18, 2000. June 29, 2000. .Keltner, Norman L., Lee Hilyard Schwecke, and Carol E. Bostrom. Psychiatric nursing. 3rd ed. St. Louis: Mosby, 1999.Presley, Delma E. An American Memory. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1990. Reser, Rob. "A touch of glass." June 29, 2000. .Williams, Tennessee. The glass menagerie. Literature and the writing process. 5th ed. Elizabeth McMahan, Susan X. Day and Robert Funk. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice, 1999. 693-734.