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August Wilson Influence

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August Wilson and His Influence on American Theatre by Isaac Harris

As I sit here, on my couch, researching a man named August Wilson, who died ten years ago, I wonder why he is still taking up my time. What has he done in his life that is oh-so important that he is still stressing teenagers out over an essay they have to write about him. Well, for starters, he won 25 theatre awards over the course of 25 years, he wrote 16 plays, ten of which correlated directly to each other and his life, and he is influencing playwrights all over the world to this day. August Wilson connected all his plays to one another, starting a trend that is still prevalent today, as seen in much of Tim Burton’s work. Wilsons collection is called “The Pittsburgh …show more content…

This play showcases a singer songwriter trying to make a name for herself, but soon realizes her band is jeopardizing her chances of hitting it big. This play was nominated twice and won the 1985 New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best American Play. The third play, in chronological order by release date, is “Fences”, released in 1987, which takes place in the 1950’s. This play is about an African American man named Troy, who was a stellar baseball player in his youth, but is now retired and is struggling to pay the bills and support his family. He becomes a garbage man, but wonders why he can’t be a truck driver, and determines it has something to do with race. This play won five awards, including the Pulitzer Prize and a Tony. The next play, the fourth, is “Joe Turner’s Come and Gone”, which takes place in the 1910’s and was released in 1988. This play explores how the first generation of free African American’s deal with racism and intolerance in the real world. Another play regarding racism, this is when Wilson truly began to show his distaste for intolerance. This play was nominated three times and won the 1988 New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best

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August Wilson’s play Fences was written in 1983. Fences is the sixth play in Wilson’s Pittsburgh cycle. Pittsburgh is important because it represents a better life for blacks; it provides them with jobs and helped them to escape the poverty and racism of the south after the civil war. It represents promises and promises that were broken. I feel like Fences represents the struggles Troy and his family faced because of their complexion and their constant disappointments as black people.

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August wilson's play Joe Turner's Come and Gone is a powerful play that portrays the experience of slavery in the past of African Americans society. This play strongly shows life of black Americans through several different characters, which can be seen as a one whole community of theirs. A clear picture is shown of how they had to fight in order to regain their existence and real identity(not as slaves) in the real world society. So, in the play, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, August Wilson presents a few subject matter of displacement, racial discrimination and pursuit of identity. This play does not exactly falls exactly into one particular single genre of drama , but the best we can say is that it is a hybrid of Tragedy, Melodrama,Comedy and Farce.

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The play, Fences by August Wilson, is about Troy Maxson and his struggling family relationships. A recurring idea throughout the story is the construction of a fence around Troy's home. Troy's fence could symbolize two things, Troy is trying to protect his family from the outside world, or Troy is isolating himself from his own family. As the construction of the fence progresses, the more severely damaged Troy's relationships become. In this play, the underlying message is that, despite the fact that fences can both protect and isolate, Troy’s fence isolates him from his family rather than to protect his family.

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In summary, the play “Fences “setting was set during the 1950’s in Pittsburg, where many African Americans were fighting for their rights. Many of the minority population were getting treated poorly and unfairly. Troy Maxson, his wife and son lived off a small alley in a big-city. The main character Troy was a sanitation worker and former Negro League baseball player.

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August Wilson's play Fences addresses a great content of interpreting and inheriting history. Throughout Fences, much of the conflict emerge because the characters are at disparity with the way they see their foregoing and what they want to do with their forthcoming. Fences explores how the damaged aspirations of one generation can taint the dreams of the next generation on how they deal with the creation of their own identity when their role model is a full of dishonesty. Wilson illustrates his qualities primarily through his use of symbolism in the play Fences.  

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The play Fences is a drama written by August Wilson who was one of six children and also dealt with opeesrrions and racism when he dropped out of school due the struggles of racism. The play Fences presents the character Troy Maxson a person who has faced racism and discrimanation throughout his life. The Pulitzer Prize winning play is set in 1957-1965, a time when African-Amercians where hopeful for a better life. In Fences, racism haunts Troy Maxon’s life past and present. The play brings the view of racism in the world through Tory Maxson, family and friends.

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“A Streetcar Named Desire” is a very elegant film in which the Southern gothic culture is demonstrated profoundly. Tennessee Williams uses the characters in the play to bring about a sense of how corrupt society truly was in the 1940’s in the South. The 1940’s was marked by an immense amount of violence, alcoholism, and poverty. Women at the time were treated as objects rather than people. Throughout the play Tennessee Williams relates the aspects of Southern society to the characters in the play.

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