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An Analysis Of Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin In The Sun

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A Harlem in the Sun: How Lorraine Hansberry and Langston Hughes Synergize Famed Harlem Renaissance poet Langston Hughes no doubt had an extensive reach to the African American community at that time. However, his influence can also be traced to other writers. Lorraine Hansberry was one such writer who used a line from Hughes’ poem “Harlem (Dream Deferred)” to center her play around. She even had the poem as a preface to her tale of the Younger family just trying to make life better during the time of segregation. Within this play, A Raisin in the Sun, Hansberry seamlessly applied Hughes’ concept of deferred dreams to demonstrate the struggle of the typical African American family through her title choice and the symbolism within the characters of Mama, Walter, and Beneatha. …show more content…

It would seem befitting to choose “Harlem” to be the basis for Hansberry’s play since the whole theme is about personal aspirations being put on hold. This theme of dreams ended up applying to all the main characters appropriately because everyone had unique desires yet they were all affected by the same situation of segregation. Hughes himself wrote “Harlem” to express “some simple yet unattainable satisfaction in life…” (Davis). Arthur Davis, an English professor at Howard University, meant to explain that the universal struggle African Americans were facing at that time could collectively be understood and expressed through written form. Thus, Hansberry’s choice of using “Harlem” was a perfect selection to set the stage for her work. The two pieces could relate to each other and the public would be able to

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