To be like a "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" is to be in an extreme state of nervous worry. Like a cat treading on boiling hot metal - to be in agonising situation, jumping about - not able to remain still. Maggie is presented as being the "Cat" in this play.
"Maggie the cat" quotes Brick.
Brick: They don't look peaceful do they?
Big Daddy: No, they sure in hell don't.
Brick: They look nervous as cats?
Big Daddy: That's right, they look nervous as cats.
Brick: Nervous as a couple of cats on a hot tin roof?
Big Daddy: That's right, boy, they look like a couple of cats on a hot tin roof.
The stresses of love, or lack of it, in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof center around death - one of the other major themes of many "Love" stories. The two extremes of emotion seem to unite. And here, expose all the rugged lies and truths of a family on the brink of internal calamity.
The Characters
Maggie (Margret) is the heroine - cursed with beauty. Her attractiveness leads her to come across sometimes as vain and self centered yet as an audience we learn to pity her. We associate ourselves with her. She is discounted by the other women Big Mama and Mae because of her childilessness. She embodies the eptinome of femitnitiy - beauty, curves, admiration of men, housewife, adoring wife - yet her fertility is stripped from her. Through no fault of her own. The lack of love from her husband leads her to live her life as a Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, plagued with nerves in unrequited love that never allows her to be fully content.
“In all these years, you never believed I loved you. And I did. I did so much. I did love you. I even loved your hate and your hardness.”
“What is the victory of a cat on a hot tin roof?—I wish I knew... Just staying on it, I guess, as long as she can...”
Big Mama: Do you make Brick Happy in bed?
Margret: WHy don't you ask if he makes me happy in bed?
Big Mama: Because I know that-
Marget: It works both ways!
Big Mama: Somehting's not right! You're childish and my son drinks.
Mae: You want to talk about the truth? You're not pregnant!
Gooper: Keep still, Mae.
Mae: She's making it up!
Gooper: I said shut up.
Mae: Don't you try to kid us, Maggie!
Brick: Mae, she's not kidding you.
Mae: How can she be pregnant by you when you won't even...
Gooper: Mae, will you be quiet!
Mae: We occupy the next room and the walls between aren't soundproof. We hear the nightly pleadings and the nightly refusals!
Gooper: Keep still, Mae.
Mae: She's making it up!
Gooper: I said shut up.
Mae: Don't you try to kid us, Maggie!
Brick: Mae, she's not kidding you.
Mae: How can she be pregnant by you when you won't even...
Gooper: Mae, will you be quiet!
Mae: We occupy the next room and the walls between aren't soundproof. We hear the nightly pleadings and the nightly refusals!
Margret: Oh, you weak, beautiful people who give up with such grace. What you need is someone to take hold of you - - gently, with love, and hand your life back to you, like something gold you let go of - - and I can! I'm determined to do it - - and nothing's more determined than a cat on a tin roof - - is there? Is there, baby?
Brick is an alcoholic. His seemingly untouchable conscious is slowly revealed throughout the play. The first act is set in the bedroom. The location of soft intamacy is contrasted against Brick's cold indifference.
Margret: You look so cool, so cool, so enviably cool.
His questoinable relationship with footballing friend Skipper haunts Brick throughout the play. It is known by many character, though perhaps not by Brick himself, that he represses his homosexuality and numbs his desires with alcohol.
Big Daddy: You been passing the buck. This disgust with mendacity is disgust with yourself. You!—you dug the grave of your friend and kicked him in it!—before you'd face the truth with him!
Brick: Mendacity is a system that we live in, liquor is one way out an'death's the other.”
Big Daddy: I've got the guts to die. What I want to know is, have you got the guts to live?”
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