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Analysis Of The Piano Lesson By Augus August Wilson

1281 Words6 Pages

Just after Reconstruction, life for African Americans began to go downhill as all of their newly gained rights became suppressed because of the new laws and systems that were put in place. Many African Americans that stayed in the South did so because they wanted to continue working in agriculture, and, therefore, had the end goal of getting their own land, which let them fall into the trap that was sharecropping. Africans Americans would rent small plots of land from a landowner, and pay their debts in the form of a portion of their crops. There was also the vagrancy law, which caused any African American that was not working and had no proof that they had a job to be arrested. This leads to the convict lease system, in which wealthy, usually Caucasian American, people rented out prisoners for labor. …show more content…

The Piano Lesson was one of these plays. Set in Pittsburgh, Massachusetts, it was about a small family of African Americans. The story centers around Boy Willie Charles, and his friend, Lymon Jackson. Boy Willie, who lives in the South, drove up North to Pittsburgh with Lymon, so as to make enough money to be able to buy his own plot of land. To do that, however, he needs to sell a family heirloom which his sister is not willing to let go of. Though African Americans made some progress from the 1880s to the 1930s, August Wilson’s The Piano Lesson illustrates how the convict lease system and sharecropping caused an overwhelming lack of social and economic

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1278 Words | 6 Pages

The wealthy were in need of cheap labor, and with the amount of blacks being sentenced, most jails still functioning were overflowing with them. Leasing was designed for black convicts, and laws passed allowed towns and independent men to lease them for a price. They black convicts were put to work building railroads, levees or doing work for private owners. The convicts did work that free labor could not. Conditions were horrible and they were forced to work knee deep in muck, in malaria-ridden swamps, and to dynamite tunnels.

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545 Words | 3 Pages

August Wilson’s play, The Piano Lesson, expresses the idea that African-Americans must embrace where they've come from before they will truly be able to move forward with their life. In relation to this the piano in the play represents the Charles families years of slavery to the Sutter family, as well as a symbolic representation of the strength and resiliency of the family. Music serves the function of representing the past, present, and the future, through the family piano. The music in “The Piano Lesson” serves as a solution to the characters’ problems and an escape from their hardships. The characters were able to reconcile their pasts through the illustration of music.

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655 Words | 3 Pages

Plantation owners loved having indentured servants because it really helped them save every bit of money they could. Indentured servants did suffer a lot especially with their working schedules but, with the laws that were later passed in Virginia throughout the years and any few freedoms black had were taken away making them feel hopeless at times because of the racial diversity in the America’s at the time. Servants were being optimistic at the time, they were hoping the laws being passed would not affect their rewards for all the hard work they had endeavored throughout the four to seven year long contracts. There was many uncertainty especially with how society would treat them because of their skin color. With all these new laws being passed, most plantation owners feared for their land, indentured servants were not needed as much anymore, plantation owners turned to slavery were they had more power of the individuals and were guaranteed no profit

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156 Words | 1 Pages

Pertaining to the rights of African Americans a new south did not appear after the reconstruction. While they were “free” they were often treated harshly and kept in a version of economic slavery by either their former masters or other white people in power. Sharecropping and the crop-lien system often had a negative impact on both the black and white tenants keeping them in debt with the owner. Jim Crow laws, vigilantes and various means of disfranchisement became the normal way of life in the South. It was believed that white people were superior to black people and when they moved up in politics or socially they were harassed and threatened.

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240 Words | 1 Pages

How did Reconstruction change life for African Americans? Before Reconstruction, every African’s life was different. Some Africans worked on plantations, which meant they worked from sunrise to sunset, six days a week. They would even get food that wasn’t capable of being eaten. The plantation slaves lived in small shakes that had a dirt floor and little to no furniture.

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517 Words | 3 Pages

During this time period, blacks had many different statuses. Some were slaves forever, some were like indentured servants. They were allowed to actually own property, get married and after they served their time they were freed. Slaves were at the bottom of the social order but the individuals above them were not much better. The white people that were poor did not have as many hardships because they always thought at least they were not slaves, even though they were towards the bottom of the social structure.

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The Piano Lesson Timed Write In August Wilson’s The Piano Lesson, the story Berniece’s family and their past of enslavement and chaotic events is described throughout a play. Within the play two men named Lyman and Boy Willie come up from the South to sell watermelons and visit Berniece and Doaker in their home. As this occurs, the story begins and the relevance of an astonishing and mysterious piano is brought to life within the household.

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528 Words | 3 Pages

The emancipation of slaves occurred in the midst of the United States civil war and these newly freed people were not equipped to combat the lack of basic necessities like food, shelter

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Harry J. Elam’s novel, The Past as Present in the Drama of August Wilson, includes a very intricately written introduction section entitled, (W)righting History: A Meditation in Four Beats, that analyzes Wilson’s personal writing style. Wilson is quoted stating, “Despite my interest in history, I have always been more concerned with culture, and while my plays have an overall historical feel, their settings are fictions, and they are peopled with invented characters whose personal histories fit within the historical context in which they live” (Wilson qtd. in Elam). It is evident that Wilson exclusively requires a historical context in order to pay tribute to African American culture that has previously been ignored.

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515 Words | 3 Pages

The reconstruction period was a failure because African Americans, mainly males, were not treated with equality although the constitution said that the they were free and had the right to vote, be educated and had the right to liberty, life and the pursuit to happiness. Organizations, like the KKK, were created to harm freed slaves and their families. Laws were created such as the Black Codes restricting former slaves from their rights. African Americans endured a lot of violence over the years. “In Grayson, Texas, a white man and two friends murdered three former slaves because the wanted to ‘ thin the niggers out and drive them to their hole’”.

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168 Words | 1 Pages

In many works of literature, past events can affect, positively or negatively, the present actions, attitudes, or values of a character. In August Wilson’s The Piano Lesson Boy Willie struggles with the ghost of his past which reveals the idea of family legacy in the novel. The sources each represent the past of the Charles family. They represent the plot of revenge in the novel. Sutter represents the family that used to own the Charles Family, and the Yellow Dog represents the people killed in the train when boy Charles and his brothers tried to steal the piano.

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349 Words | 2 Pages

Reconstruction was an attempt reconcile the country and bring it back together, however it was not the success Abraham had hoped it to be when initiated before being assassinated. The failure had many effects on African American communities in both the north on the south both negative and positive. Socially black slaves were freed but not really accepted into society. Black codes were utilized which placed pressure on African Americans about things like when to meet with friends and where they should live. Discrimination against black flourished as the Ku Klux Klan a group of people who wore robes and mask went around pretending to be the ghost of Confederate soldiers.

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263 Words | 2 Pages

"Now that 's the difference between the colored man and the white man. The colored man can 't fix nothing with the law” (Wilson) is one of the main quotes that really captured my attention because of the racial content it contains. This quote comes from “The Piano Lesson” by August Wilson and even though it isn’t necessarily the main theme of the story, I personally believes it greatly impacts the audience. During this section we get an insight of Wining Boys taught that allow us to assume that he feels as if they are at a disadvantage with the law because the laws weren’t meant for color people and meant only for white people. This quote greatly stood out to me because of everything that is going in the world at this time and is why

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581 Words | 3 Pages

In The Piano Lesson, a play by August Wilson, the characters create conflict over a piano. Boy Willie and Berniece, two 1930’s African American siblings, each own a half of the piano. Because Berniece and Boy Willie’s ancestor engraved images of their family’s history into the piano, this instrument holds great importance to them. Despite this shared agreement, Berniece and Boy Willie hold different opinions about the piano’s true value and purpose. While Berniece wants to keep the piano for its sentimental value, Boy Willie desires to sell it in order to buy land from Sutter, the white, dead, and original owner of the instrument.

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354 Words | 2 Pages

In the 1800´s black people were used as slaves. Meaning the were bought and sold for working purposes. The slaves were not treated with respect, they were beaten and whipped by their masters if they were to do something wrong or if they were to disobey commands. After the Civil War black people

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