Big Walter Character Analysis

Walter Lee is stubborn, very ambitious, and filled with pride at the beginning of the story. He strives for success with the money “Mama,” also known as Lena got from the life insurance from her husband who recently passed away. Walter was so selfish all he wanted was to provide a better life for he and his family because he was not satisfied with their current standards of living. He wants more and wishes to become rich because he believes he never had enough growing up, but at the same time he wants to provide money and societal respect for his family. He put his trust with the money into a person who betrayed him and he ended up losing it all including his sisters schooling money. After this scene in the play Walter was at his lowest point,

After Mama tells Walter she was out taking care of business Walter replies with ”What kind of business?” This short simple reply from Walter gives the effect that he’s worried about something and wants an answer quick. Walter being in such a state of worrisome shows that he is really worried about the money and if Mama spent it or not. The insurance money was key to Walter’s plans of owning his own liquor store. After Mama isn’t quick to answer Walter’s first few questions he grows even more restless and says, “Where were you, Mama? Mama, you didn’t do something with that insurance money, something crazy?” Finally, Mama answers saying she took care of business Walter gets even more upset because he could tell she used the insurance money and could almost see his dream crumbling before his very own eyes. Lorraine Hansberry asks numerous questions when she writes as Walter in order to create a sense of urgency and worry on the whereabouts of the money. This is an example that supports the theme because Walter dreamt of having his own liquor store while Mama and much of their family dreamt of living in a nicer house, which she decided to

The predicament that Walter finds him-self in motivates him to want to invest in a liquor store in order to grasp some type of financial freedom. He doesn’t just want to have enough money to provide for his family, but he tells his mother, “I want so many things” (74). He is obsessed with earning a lot of money. At the beginning of the play Walter is waiting for Mama's check from the insurance company as if it was his own, and Beneathea has to remind Walter that, “that money belongs to Mama, Walter and if is for her to decide how she wants to spend it” (36). Here we see how he is searching for his identity with money. Much of Walter’s dialog is about making money or who has money. When his wife Ruth mentions that his friend Willy Harris is a good for nothing loud mouth, Walter retorts; “...And what do know about good for nothing loud mouth? Charlie Atkins was just a good-for-nothing loud mouth too, wasn’t he! He wanted me to go in the dry-cleaning business with him, and now he’s grossing a hundred thousand a year. A hundred thousand dollars a year! You still call him a loud mouth!” (32) The idea of making a hundred thousand dollars is what he had most on his mind, and to Walter the liquor store is how he will achieve that. The liquor store represents an

Walter is in for a big surprise. When his mother finds out about his plans, she rains on his parade. She decides to exercise her authority as the holder of the check. She’s going to fulfill her dream instead; buy a house, with a garden, for her family. Walter still thinks he’s going to get the money.

Walter seems to be overcome with a search for power and a drive to become wealthy and leave the life of being a worker behind him. It also shows that he cares for his family seeing how he is striving to give them the best, but that aspect is overshadowed by his greed. I feel the scene also shows the Younger family at its lowest point in the movie. Walter is on the complete edge and is thinking of stealing a community's money and the rest of the family, besides Momma, seemed to lose their faith and trust in him. When things seemed hopeless with the loss of the money, they only became worse as a loss in more than money occurred. A loss in their character, faith, history, and respect for each other overcame the family, particularly Walter and Beneatha. Nevertheless, Momma soon sets Beneatha straight with an emotional and positive speech about how there is "always something left to love" and sets the standard that the family should adhere to. It marks the turning point at the end of the movie

Walter focused solely on the money and this caused him to think that all the money is his and he can go and do as he pleases. He was obviously disappointed when Mama did not give him any of the money initially but when she entrusted him with the remaining $6,500 it brought about a sense of pride and responsibility that had long eluded him. It was almost a renewing moment for Walter as his family life changed for the better since he was now acting as the man of the house.

In Lorraine's Hansberry A Raisin In The Sun. Walter wants to make money to support his family. He wants money because he thinks it makes him a “man”. How ever when his money is stolen, Walter’s perceptions of manhood shifts from valuing wealth and power to valuing family and pride.

Walter presumes that ‘it’s always money’ and how Mama can’t use it in the right way. Walter later responds that ‘money is life,’ explaining to Mama that success is now defined by how much money one has. This conversation takes place early in the play and reveals Mama’s and Walters economic struggles. However we see a turn of events when Walter plans to accept Mr. Lindner’s offer. Walter is not concerned with the degrading implications of the business deal; it is simply a way to recover some of the lot money. However, Hansberry challenges Walter’s crude interpretation of the American Dream by forcing him to actually carry out the transaction in front of his son. Walter’s inability to deal with Mr. Linder marks a significant revision of his interpretation of the American Dream. Walter comes to a realisation that money is not everything and how family is so much more valuable. During the late 1950’s money was defined as one of the main characteristics of a man, and who that man will become. Walters dream is to obtain enough money to provide enough for his family, this dream of his suggests how his American Dream is also vanished, as money was an immense part of this dream of his. Wily Loman is the complete opposite; he fails to understand that there is so much more to becoming successful than being rich. The failure to understand this concept brought him to a sudden death. Willy is like every

Mama attempts to reference back to Big Walter in certain situations to use him as an example to show her family the true meanings of sacrifice and unification within a family. The Raisin in the Sun refers back to Big Walter and how he labored so hard for his family all the time. He put his dreams aside, which ended up drying up like “A Raisin in the Sun” (M’baye 171). Mama says, “Yes, [he was] a fine man- just couldn’t never catch up with his dreams that’s all” (Hansberry 30). Mama refers back to Big Walter as an example for her family to see because Big Walter worked his but off for the important things in life like family. He had dreams like everybody does, but he did not ever get so caught up that he lost track of his priorities. He labored day and night for his family to have everything they needed. That is the example Mama tries to use to talk to her children about family. Big Walter did whatever he had to do to supply for his family whether that meant working a few extra hours or even a few extra days. Every once and a while he may have worked an extra job just to provide the

Suddenly, things changed, and Walter and his family came into quite a bit of money. Walter’s mama got a check for ten thousand dollars from her husbands life insurance after he passed away, which was a lot of money in that period of time. A nice house or a liquor store could easily be bought with half of the money from the check. Since the check was actually written out to mama, the money was all technically hers, so all that she wanted to do with it was buy her new house for her family, but stubborn Walter, he wanted his liquor store, and would stop at nothing to get it. When he finally realized that his mama was never going to give him the money to get the liquor store, he took it upon himself to get it himself. He eventually stole a portion of his mama’s money to get the store, but he was taken for a fool when the other person that he was making a deal with, stole all of his money. Now he had nothing, and mama had only some of her money.

For these reasons, Mother bought the family a new house and put it in the name of Walter's son, Travis. In other words, she made an investment in Walter's future and his family. Mother saw the family falling apart and that their feelings of resentment for one another, and general discouragement in their lives, was an effect from living like sardines in their tiny dreary apartment. Walter, however, did not see it this way and felt nobody would listen to what he wanted. He wanted the same thing as his mother, to make an investment in his and his family's future, but he had his own idea of how to do it. As he tries to explain to his mother, "Sometimes I

In ''A Raisin in the Sun'' Hansberry uses Walter Lee Younger to represent the ambitious but, uninformed African American family. Walter's main role in 'A Raisin in the Sun' is to personify the African American families that make many gambles, which eventually lead to complete failure. Walter is shadowed by greed and ignorance which causes him to fail to achieve the success he wishes to gain. Walter Lee Youngers' greed is exemplified when he talks about, "Check coming today." (Hansberry 26). Walter's lack of wisdom and hard headedness allows him to portray American success, which he hopes of achieving in a very short time. When Walter Younger fails at what he has been trying to do he exclaims, "THAT MONEY IS MADE OUT OF MY FATHER'S FLESH."

What immediately struck me about the first sequence is the noticeable power imbalance between Walter and Phyllis; in this moment Phyllis is the one wielding it. Looking back on the scene after watching the entire movie, the power imbalance is all the more noticeable to me. Multiple techniques in the sequence subtly highlight this imbalance and hint at Phyllis’ true motivations. The scene begins with Walter driving up to the Dietrichson home. The outdoors lighting is bright, there are children playing in the streets, and a beautiful view of the landscape and homes beyond the street. The car Walter Neff drives is obviously dark against the light scene surrounding it. Later scenes where we see the house, more specifically the garage, it’s nighttime and covered in darkness. It’s almost as if it symbolizes the darkness that entered that home the moment Walter and Phyllis crossed paths. When we first see Phyllis, she’s at the top of the stairs in the front entrance of the home. The room is shaded, except for light emanating from the window that lands right where Phyllis is standing in just her towel. The layout of the maid, Walter, the stairs, and various pieces of furniture all appear to form a Fibonacci spiral that leads the viewer’s focus straight to Phyllis. It’s no coincidence that in

Showing his frustration to his mother, Walter does not feel like he will ever acquire his dream because he feels like he never got the chance or opportunity to. The inability of not able to provide a better life for his household is causing him to stress, act out of character and clouding his decision making. With nowhere else to turn he thought he could use his father’s life insurance money to invest into a liquor store which turned into a scam. Walter feeling trapped from making advancements in life, he makes a huge mistake and learns from this error. In the play Walter is talking to mother describing his anger,

First, Ruth, is one of the women in the house who changes Walter’s decisions in the story. Her relationship towards him is poor. Ruth nags at the beginning, saying “Eat your eggs Walter” (Hansberry 34). This angers him because she repeats it multiple times throughout, not understanding him, showing their strained relationship. Ruth is also shown to not be on Walter’s side on multiple occasions. For example, when Walter finds out that Mama spent the money on a new house, he does not like it. Ruth however is not feeling the same way as him, and tells him “Walter honey, be glad” (Hansberry 92). Ruth tells Walter to be glad, because their views are different. Ruth thinks this was beneficial to the family, yet Walter does not. This hurts Walter throughout the story as he feels alone with no one on his side. Walter know this when he says “Cause ain’t nobody with Me! Not even my own mother!” (Hansberry 85). Since he is alone, and believes no one cares about him, he tries to fix his own mistake when he decides he will get more money saying, “That White man is going to walk in that door all to write checks for more money than we ever had.” (Hansberry 143). Ruth does not like Walter’s idea, but he does not care as no one is on his side, which disappoints Ruth.