Comparing A Raisin In The Sun And Langston Hughes's Harlem

There is a thematic connection between A Raisin in the Sun and Langston Hughes’s Harlem, because lines from the poem mirror the way both Mama and Walter’s dreams are deferred. Mama’s deferred goal of keeping the family together relates to Harlem through the slow decline in their unity. First of all, when Mama explains how she had “just seen my family falling apart today... just falling to pieces in front of my eyes... we couldn’t of gone on like we were today” (94), it means how Mama’s dream of a unified family is crumbling before her very eyes as their relationships deteriorate. She discerned how their bonds weakened, argument after argument. With no other solutions in mind, she decided to buy a house so that they could get a fresh start. Meanwhile, Harlem describes how a dream deferred “just sags like a heavy load” (lines 8-9). The quote from the poem explains how dreams sag like a heavy load when they fail. These details exemplify Mama’s connection to the meaning of Harlem. It indicates how problems arose while Mama was holding on to her dream. She is desperate to keep the family together as the “heavy load” of problems and …show more content…

In the poem, it asks if deferred dreams “fester like a sore—And then run?” (lines 3-4), which is similar to when Walter loses all the money. Walter’s sister Beneatha is devastated by that and exclaims “While I was sleeping in that bed there, people went out and took the future right out of my hands.they just went out and changed my life!” (134). Walter’s failed investment crushed his dreams of owning a liquor store, Beneatha’s dreams of becoming a doctor, Ruth’s future baby, and any hope of keeping the family united. Not only did Walter’s ambition and motivation fester like a sore from being scammed out of money, but the consequences of his investment ended up “running out of the wound” and affecting the whole