Symbolism In A Raisin In The Sun

The play Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry is identified as a modernist text for it challenges the life of African-American families living in an industrial environment. Walter and Beneatha’s mother,

Symbols can be; images, signs, colors, sounds, shapes, anything. It is like how blue can stand for sadness, and how the sun can stand for happiness. Symbolism is an object or an idea that has a representation beyond the literal meaning of the object. The functions of symbols are to add meaning to the text and underline some subtle point the author is making, also to give the reader a clue about the mood of the story and what will happen. The symbols Lorraine Hansberry used in A Raisin in the Sun are the light, plant, and the window. All three symbols; the light, the plant, and the window, have to go together for the Youngers to reach their dream.

One might ask how the scientific facts of the functional purpose of a plant would connect to a literary piece, especially the well-known play, A Raisin in the Sun, written by Lorraine Hansberry. The plant in the text symbolizes the foundation for the family, honest hope, and Mama's dreams. Symbolism is not a definition of an item, but represents something specific other than itself. Much like Mama's plant, it represents many meaningful ideas with supportive evidence throughout the text. The plant standing alone may seem like a generic addition to the setting of the Younger household, but when it is observed in a deeper analytical approach; the symbolism of it in itself holds such

Throughout the story “A Raisin in the Sun”, Lorraine Hansberry creates the theme of the story by introducing tension between the characters on what each ones dream is in life.

Primarily, in A Raisin in the Sun portrays a low-class African American family, living on the Southside of Chicago in the 1950’s. Throughout the play, an opportunity to escape from poverty comes in the form of ten thousand dollars of a life insurance check for the family ( Mrs. Younger, mama ) received upon her husband’s death. Lorraine Hansberry’s play shows the struggles of accomplishing dreams and how racism still exists today.

Lorraine Hansberry’s play “A Raisin in the Sun,” was a radically new representation of black life, resolutely authentic, fiercely unsentimental, and unflinching in its vision of what happens to people whose dreams are constantly deferred.

Lorraine Hansberry’s play, A Raisin in the Sun, centers on an African American family in the late 1950s. Hansberry directs her work towards specifically the struggles faced by African Americans during the late 1950s. Through the dialogue and actions of her characters, she encourages not only a sense of pride in heritage, but a national and self-pride in African Americans as well.

Symbolism is a major tool used throughout the book “A Raisin in the Sun”. The author, Lorraine Hansberry, does a great job using symbolism in her play to convey her point. Lorraine Hansberry uses a variety of different things as symbols such as objects as well as people. The use of symbolism in the play is crucial because it helps understand things better and in more depth.

Lorraine Hansberry’s play A Raisin in the Sun opened in a New York theater March 11, 1951. This play, although based on Hansberry’s own life and personal experiences was also inspired by Langston Hughes’s poem “Harlem”. Hansberry used this play to tell the story of a 1950’s African American family trying to better themselves. She also used this play to shine a light on the issue of racism that were prominent during this time frame. This highly successful play “ran for 530 performances and was nominated for the 1960 Tony Award for best play”, and has had several adaptations made in its honor(Aurora). Despite the fact that these adaptations were made to equal the original play there are many differences between them and their predecessor.

The new house, the money and even Mama’s “raggedy looking” plant are all symbols of the book A Raisin in the Sun which is portrayed to parallel the difficulties presented to minorities in America. A Raisin in the Sun, yet more specifically, captures the concept of the struggles the African Americans endured during the period of the book, late 1940s to 1950. In the book the characters each reflects the stereotype of the typical Afro-American in America trying to make the best out of their opportunities, each symbol in the book represents the ideal situations correlated with it the struggles.

Lorraine Hansberry’s play, A Raisin in the Sun features an African American family in the late 1950’s as they look forward to achieving their individual dreams in the era where racism and economic hardship among African Americans was the norm. While Hansberry doesn’t directly mention well-known events in the civil rights movement, she illustrates the realistic struggles an African American family would have faced during this time. In the introduction of the play, Robert Nemiroff illustrates several themes and issues that are addressed throughout Hansberry’s play. One of the subjects Nemiroff mentions is the “value systems of the black family”(Nemiroff, “Introduction,” 5-6). A main value that Hansberry illustrates throughout the play is the

    Lorraine Hansberry faced many obstacles in her life which has made her  write this book A “Raisin in the Sun.” As said in Blooms Literature “She was the youngest of four children whose parents were well-educated, middle-class activists centrally engaged in the fight against racial discrimination. Early figures in the Civil Rights movement.” In the book “A Raisin in the Sun,” the first play written by an African American she made through experiences of  black people who live on Chicago’s South Side, Hansberry used members of her family as inspiration for her characters. Lorraine Hansberry life had comparisons in this book dealing with poverty

Just as any well composed story or film, in A Raisin in the Sun there are structural elements that strategically map the play. Moreover, I contend that the inciting incident would be the fact that the family was expecting a large life insurance check from the death of Mr. Walter Lee Younger, Sr. In the 1950s, $10,000 was a large amount of money, especially for working class African Americans. It was not surprising that everyone in the family had their own plans as to how they would have liked to spend the lump-sum amount of money. The crisis point of the plot, then, would be the fact that the Younger family was an African American working class family, struggling financially during a time of high racial prejudice—the civil rights era. The rising action would include Ruth getting pregnant with a second child, Mrs. Younger using some of the insurance money to make a down payment on a new house, Mrs. Younger giving Walter the remaining amount of the insurance check, and ultimately, Walter investing the money into a liquor store. The climax of the story would be when Walter found out that his business partner ran off with the insurance money, and consequently, the family loses over half the insurance money to the null investment. The falling action? Walter refused to accept Mr. Lindner’s offer to buy the family out of the new neighborhood, and the family finally moved into a new, spacious home in a new neighborhood.

Imagery in The Raisin In The Sun displays uniquely to distinguishes each feeling or reaction proceeding to the characters. The reader gets more of a better image of situation, actions and feelings as illustrated “Mama: Son do you know your wife is expecting another baby? (Walter stands stunned and absorbs what his mother has said.) That’s what she wanted to talk to you about…” (Act 1 Scene 2 Page:1568.) With this image you can examine him feel so much emotion Walter at that time. The imagery of him just sitting there blank as stone, the feeling of anguish, speechlessness and surprised with the news that may seem as bad news giving him the image of unhappiness. Furthermore, it exposes the possibility to be a restriction Walters dream and the families dream as said according to Mama: “Mama: I'm waiting to see you stand up and look like your daddy and says we done giving up nary another one… I'm waiting.” This is a big interpretation towards the American Dream that they needed money but it was a load of work to provide enough for Travis and the baby. It consumes the part of Walter that he can't explain with money, it was his one and only chance to use properly for himself. In Addition, Walter is not just being selfish but he is just seeing the outcomes of his dream be put down. Then again there was also a big huge family that was living in the house; in which was also needing to provide Mama but she expected more from her son, to be wise enough to choose between the right and

Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry was one of the first plays to realistically and accurately portray the struggles of an African-American family on stage. Before Raisin in the Sun, many black characters on stage were based on stereotypes, not reality. However, Hansberry’s depiction was authentic, even unflattering, and far from comedic. She utilized black vernacular and illustrated the important issues African-Americans faced; poverty, discrimination, segregation. The characters’ authenticity was due to Hansberry basing much of the play on her own life.