Beneatha In A Raisin In The Sun

In life, people struggle to fit in no matter the circumstances; often, it is impossible to change people's perspectives. The playwright and civil rights activist, Lorraine Hansberry, was best known for her play A Raisin in the Sun, which explores the lives of an African American family living on the South Side of Chicago during the 1950s. All of the members of the family have dreams, but a character named Beneatha and her dreams are certainly reflected in the poem “Harlem” by Langston Hughes. Moreover, Hansberry's dreams are also reflected through Beneatha, as shown in her background/biography. Lorraine Hansberry uses the character of Beneatha to represent her own struggles: Beneatha’s intersecting identities of being black and a woman, along

After Beneatha wakes up to yelling in the morning, Walter Lee greets her but then starts an argument about how they should spend the money from the check coming in tomorrow. Walter brings up Beneatha’s pricey dreams of becoming a doctor, which makes her snap. She sarcastically exclaims, “Well–I do–all right–thank everybody! And forgive me for ever wanting to be anything at all! FORGIVE ME, FORGIVE ME, FORGIVE ME!” (Hansberry 37). The repetition of the capitalized phrase, “forgive me” proves how unseriously Beneatha is treated in the family, and in this case, by Walter. This is because she is the only one with individual ambitions in education, yet sarcastically apologizes for them because they are seen as abnormal and unrealistic in the African American community. Walter uses her strange intersecting identities against her in this situation, as he belittles them and treats her differently to attain a reaction out of Beneatha. Beneatha’s disgraceful dream is further illustrated by Langston Hughes in his poem “Harlem,” which questions, “What happens to a dream deferred?/Maybe it just sags/Like a heavy load” (Hughes). When Hughes mentions how a dream deferred can “sag Like a heavy load” he is implying that the dream becomes a burden too heavy to carry. This connects to Beneatha and her aspiration of becoming a doctor because of the expectations placed upon her by her family, which clash with her intersecting identities. Walter communicating his distaste for her dreams only contributes to the overall separation of Beneatha and society. These factors essentially weigh her down, overwhelming her and fundamentally causing her desire for her career to