Three authors present characters who are disturbed, whose disturbance has a particular effect on friends and family, and whose problems are addressed in different ways by the authors. Tennessee Williams creates a memorable character in Blanche DuBois, the genteel Southern lady whose sexual obsessions are followed by her in a world of illusions by which she maintains some sense of self. She comes up against harsh reality in the form of her sister’s husband, Stanley Kowalski. Lila Wingo is the mother of the suicidal patient in Pat Conroy’s novel Prince of Tides, and she has her illusions as well. She is a source of distress not only for her daughter but for her son, Tom–daughter and son are twins. Beth Jarrett in Judith Guest’s novel Ordinary People is a third woman who uses illusions to protect herself from the outside world and from the reality that would destroy…