Clothes for a Summer Hotel

by Tennessee Williams

The late Tennessee Williams’s Clothes for a Summer Hotel made its New York debut in 1980. Here Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, often seen as symbols of the doomed youth of the jazz age, become two halves of s single creative psyche, each part alternately feeding and then devouring the other.

Set in Highland Hospital near Asheville, North Carolina, where Zelda spent her last confinement, this “ghost play” begins several years after Scott’s death of a heart attack in California. But the past is “still always present” in Zelda, and Williams’s constant shifting of chronology and mixing of remembrance with ghostly re-enactment suggest that our real intimacy is with the shadow characters of our own minds. As Williams said the Author’s Note to the Broadway production: “Our reason for taking extraordinary license with time and place is that in an asylum and on its grounds liberties of this kind are quite prevalent: and also these liberties allow us to explore in more depth what we believe is truth of character."

Williams poses the inevitable, unanswerable questions: Did Scott prevent Zelda from achieving an independent creativity? Did Zelda’s demands force Scott to squander his talents and turn to alcohol? Whose betrayal — emotional, creative, sexual — destroyed the other? But he poses these questions in a new way: in the act of creation, Zelda and Scott are now aware of their eventual destruction, and the creative fire that consumed the two artists combines symbolically with the fire that ended Zelda’s life.

Genres: Plays, Theatre, Fiction, Ebooks, Classics, American

77 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1981

About the author

Thomas Lanier Williams III, better known by the nickname Tennessee Williams, was a major American playwright of the twentieth century who received many of the top theatrical awards for his work. He moved to New Orleans in 1939 and changed his name to "Tennessee," the state of his father's birth.

Raised in St. Louis, Missouri, after years of obscurity, at age 33 he became famous with the success of The Glass Menagerie (1944) in New York City. This play closely reflected his own unhappy family background. It was the first of a string of successes, including A Streetcar Named Desire (1947), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955), Sweet Bird of Youth (1959), and The Night of the Iguana (1961). With his later work, he attempted a new style that did not appeal to audiences. His drama A Streetcar Named Desire is often numbered on short lists of the finest American plays of the 20th century, alongside Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman.

Much of Williams' most acclaimed work has been adapted for the cinema. He also wrote short stories, poetry, essays and a volume of memoirs. In 1979, four years before his death, Williams was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.

From Wikipedia

Reviews

[Teresa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Though I haven't done it in a long time, I used to read plays by certain playwrights in bunches. Tennessee Williams is one of my favorites, but I've never read him like that. Perhaps that's for the best, as his perceived excesses may not be conducive to such reading. This is not a play of excess, though it's certainly complex.

I heard about this play during a panel at the Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival a couple of weekends ago and it sounded intriguing. It is more than that -- it is brilliant.

The main characters are Zelda and F. Scott Fitzgerald, with appearances from their friends, including Hadley and Ernest Hemingway. Zelda could be seen in the mode of other Williams' creations, such as Blanche DuBois or Amanda Wingfield, but Williams subverts that expectation. Contradictions abound. As with any well-rounded creation, sympathies shift from character to character.

Judging from what the panelists on "Writing Tennessee's Story" at the Fest said, the play was ahead of its time -- and it closed in a matter of days. I don't think an audience today would have trouble with the 'ghosts', the shifting time and the layers of meanings, including those about the creator and the created. I could, and probably should, read it again.

One of the panelists, 95-year-old poet William Jay Smith -- 7 years younger than Williams, he said that is why he was able to be with us! -- was in a poetry-writing group with Tom (as he called him) back in their St. Louis days, and said this last play of Williams' was "Shakespearean" and "completely misunderstood." Another panelist, the director David Kaplan agreed, calling it "Strindberg-like" with its ghosts walking through walls. He added that it takes twenty years for theatre critics to "catch up" to new modes. About this play, he said the critics "didn't understand it, didn't want to, didn't want others to."

[Bethany Wilk · Rating 4 out of 5]

There were some really beautiful lines in this play, as well as some quite funny ones--and I would read an entire book for one beautiful line. I can see why it wasn't well received and critics called it disjointed, though. I was more interested in the characters than the structure, but I was a little disappointed that he used such obvious material to recreate Scott, Zelda, and Hemingway. The drinking, the affair, the ballet obsession. The scenes between Scott and Hemingway taken from "A Moveable Feast." On the other hand, I could still appreciate Zelda's passion and desire for her own identity, and William's interpretation (projection?) of Scott's sexuality and alcoholism/creativity.

[Jason Hillenburg · Rating 3 out of 5]

The last Broadway play from the legendary dramatist and largely savaged by critics during a disastrous run. It is, unquestionably, a flawed work. Williams expends an unforgiving and unnecessary amount of near vitriol framing Fitzgerald as the play's antagonist while a handful of high flown conceits about mental illness are offered up as evidence for Zelda's character alongside the typical theorizing that Fitzgerald felt threatened by her potentially greater artistry.

Accepting this is, as the subtitle makes clear, a "ghost play" comprised of characters disembodied from conventional linear narrative and natural laws isn't a stretch. Williams, however, goes for obvious symbolism in a work that demands more nuance and transitions are often clumsily handled rather than orchestrated. Williams makes a particularly poor decision to have Zelda addressing the audience during a key scene,

There are a number of effective conversations and moments of outright poetry strewn throughout the play. The second act is stronger than the first and has some swaths of fiery dialogue. Despite its problems, Williams manages to capture something gossamer like about the iconic couple shared. It's guarded affection and their aches are palpably framed.

For Williams devotees only.

[Natalie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rarely staged, this play is, definitely, one of the best T. William's works. "Zelda at the Oasis", presently running in NYC, is a brilliant re-arrangement of the "Clothes for a summer hotel".
Was Zelda really mad or did she just try to escape from "prescribed" reality into sweetness of madness, that became her asylum, the only viable mean of bearing unbearable living in Scott's shadow? These questions keep hunting a reader/a theater-goer long after the play is over, sticking to your mind, disturbing your imagination...

[Susanna · Rating 3 out of 5]

I rarely read drama for fun, and this is the only piece of Tennessee Williams' work I've read, but I thought it was really really good.

[Gretta · Rating 3 out of 5]

There is a lot of Physicality written into this show. I think seeing it would be a completely different experience to reading it.

[Jojo · Rating 3 out of 5]

I can't say I know much about the Fitzgeralds (though I do believe I read a biography on Zelda years! ago) so other than reading up on wikipedia afterwards, not sure how accurate the content is but I thought this was pretty good. Kinda neat how Williams was writing about other authors of similar time period.
Grade: B-

[Brooke West · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’d like to give this book 3 1/2 stars. I really want to see it staged... I had trouble following and visualizing, which made it difficult to engage fully. However, there was a lot that I loved - particularly in Zelda’s character.

[Nate Briggs · Rating 1 out of 5]

Absolute garbage - and probably could have been used in court to demonstrate the author's galloping senility. All extant copies of this should be located and burned.

[Lillian · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's a bit interesting but a little confusing at the same time. Perhaps it would be better when seen performed.

[Isabelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

wow.
This was my first Tennessee Williams play and am genuinely considering this for my senior direct!!

[Jude Morse · Rating 2 out of 5]

Jesus I can’t stand this I hate watching people who are both awful with no redeemable category’s. Read this if you want I guess

[Rachel Swords · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'd venture to say this is one of Williams's lesser known plays. First performed in 1980, just a few years before his death, "Clothes" has the same sort of conflict as written in "Glass Menagerie" (ie the back and forth arguments between Amanda and Tom), but with a married couple in a love/hate relationship here. For me, Zelda was the protagonist of the piece, with her famous husband, F. Scott Fitzgerald, serving as the villain. I don't know a lot about their relationship in real life, but if it's anything like in "Clothes for a Summer Hotel," I feel quite sorry for Zelda! Literary enthusiasts will also note the appearance of a Fitzgerald contemporary, Ernest Hemingway, and a brief mention of Joseph Conrad. Overall, if you're wanting a Tennessee Williams play quite different from any of his more famous works, look no further than "Clothes for a Summer Hotel."

[Malcolm Pellettier · Rating 3 out of 5]

not sure how sober MR. Williams was in writing this, granted he wasn't sober writing much.

Late Williams tackles fitzgerald, Zelda, and Hemingway, and concludes Hemingway might've been an over-compensating momma's boy!? you don't say.

Awesome premise that should've been much better.

May go read Zelda now......

[Mary Paul · Rating 2 out of 5]

A rare few bits of good dialogue, but mostly masturbatory fantasies of dead heroes. Not his best work. Because I know so much of the writers involved, their lives and works, I can't but help feel they'd be rolling in their graves reading this.

[Utrillo Kushner · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zelda!

[Marissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wonderful play
mysterious and creepy

[Yasmin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tennessee Williams has always had a knack for beautiful lines. This 'ghost play' was truly haunting and left me with chills.

[Patti · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vintage Williams. I think it would be much more interesting on stage, if properly done, than it is to read. I've written 2 short plays about Zelda and "The Great Gatsby", including the position that much of the piece was actually hers. So I was eager to read TW's take on this and he doesn't disappoint. But it was pretty purple for a straight read. Please, someone, do a production and do it well...

[Cora · Rating 4 out of 5]

i wish i knew more about hemingway to understand that interaction better - but overall this was really interesting - i like how tennessee williams is able to make all the Scandale of f. scott // zelda Obvious and out in the open while still unfolding the sequence of events gradually - like the Meaning is obvious but never explicitly stated.
also nice to see some more justification of f. scott's gay crisis haha (don't we all)
i don't know if this is an accurate representation of these actual people, but it potentially offers some insight into these illustrious individuals and their private lives (which may or may not have influenced their writing)

anyway i really like f. scott fitzgerald and tennessee williams so this was a Good Choice