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Character Analysis Of Walter Younger In Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin In The Sun

946 Words4 Pages

When someone takes an opportunity right from under everyone else’s feet, how would you see it? Selfish? Desperate? Or hard working? In A Raisin in the Sun, Lorraine Hansberry shows how difficult it was for colored people in the 1950s get ahead and become successful. Walter younger, an ambitious man who comes across as self centered because of his dream to find success for him and his family, goes to great lengths and makes sacrifices to try and make money. It may seem like Walter wants everything for himself, but deep down, he means no harm besides making money and wanting to prosper and live comfortably. Walter Younger and his family, wife Ruth, son Travis, Mama, and sister Beneatha, live in Chicago. All five of them live in a small apartment not fit for the size of their family. Mama, …show more content…

You could almost say that Walter has a roller coaster of emotions. He starts off as selfish because Mama refuses to invest her money in a liquor store for Walter. He then puts up a stink and goes missing throughout the day. This all quickly changes when Mama gives Walter what he has been wanting and hands him the rest of the insurance money. Clearly, Walter only shows happiness when he has what he wants. Soon after, Walter invests the money and lends it to his friend to start the process of opening the liquor store. In the eyes of the reader, what probably sounds like a bad idea, turns into reality when his friends scam him and take his money. Beneatha gloats to Walter on his bad investment, forcing him to make it right. Mama second guesses buying the house, but Walter stands up for what his right and his ambitious side comes out and insists on moving into the new house. These chain of events just mentioned are great examples of Walter as a dynamic character. His constantly changing views and personality all relate to Walter wanting to become a successful colored

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778 Words | 4 Pages

In the beginning Walter is basically perceived as a jerk-he doesn’t seem to get along with anyone, not even his own family. His character likes to turn discussions into fights, make rude comments to his wife, and act all around immature. A part that accurately shows the way Walter conducts himself is when he is arguing with Ruth and says “Man say: I got to change my life , I'm choking to death, baby! And his woman say- Your eggs is getting cold!”

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1016 Words | 5 Pages

This changes him because he realizes that not everything has to go his way. The second example of Walter changing is when he loses the rest of the money. This changes him because he realizes how irresponsible and childish he was acting. The final example of

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932 Words | 4 Pages

Even when Walter is at his darkest moment, and he has crossed Mama, she still tells Beneatha to show empathy for him. He tried to live his dream, and took a leap of faith, but everything had been stolen away from him. Even though he makes the bad decisions of how to go

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600 Words | 3 Pages

He wants to be a businessman and own a liquor store. He wants to be able to provide for his family and give them what they have never had. Walter also wants to take his mother’s position as the head of the house and make the financial decisions for the family. Walter can be seen as selfish as instead of putting the money for him and his sister in the bank he uses it all and loses it trying to fulfill his own dreams with no regard to his sister’s dreams or the rest of the family’s.

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1243 Words | 5 Pages

Walter feels his job is more than unsatisfying, and can not make Mama understand, since her simplistic views are just like Ruths. In spite of his personal inadequacies with his job fulfillment, Walter shines in the end of the story with understanding and growth of his own fathers not so wonderful job. Walter seems to be reflecting on his own status as a

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1414 Words | 6 Pages

He believes he is “..see[ing] life like it is” (141) in order to rightfully take his place as the head of the family by making this decision for them, regardless of the hope this house brought them all. The rest of the Younger family is disconcerted by this new business deal, and asks Walter if this is what he truly wants and believes is right, to which he responds that he’s “Going to feel fine…[like] a man…” (144). Due to internally knowing he still had prove himself but not physically doing so, Walter’s delicate, false pride in being a man doesn’t allow him to consider how his actions affect

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866 Words | 4 Pages

Both characters try to reach their dreams by moving their families and responsibility aside. For example, Walter Lee dreams of opening a liquor store, so to reach his dreams he took his family is money trying to act like a man but then that money was stolen by his friend Willy

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861 Words | 4 Pages

Walter states that the Youngers are a calm, good family who “don’t want to make no trouble for nobody,” and are not looking to stir up trouble. All they intend to be is hard working, peaceful “good neighbors” and that give them every right to live in Clybourne Park. Afterwards, Mama, talking to Ruth about Walter, states that, “he finally come into his manhood today,” (151). Walter made his family proud and after much struggle they feel that he has matured. For Mama proudly exclaims that Walter “come into his manhood” by doing the morally right thing “finally.”

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1127 Words | 5 Pages

Walter dealt with a hardship in his live as well. Walter was faced with racial discrimination. He wanted to have money to be able to to what he wants, follow his dreams. The only problem is that he didn 't have a high paying job. Your probably thinking to yourself why doesn 't he just get another job.

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1487 Words | 6 Pages

Walter further shows his false pride when he flaunts his newfound sense of power when Mr.Lindner, one of the Younger’s soon-to-be neighbors, offers him an unjust deal. Now that Walter has control over the family 's money, he considers himself the head of the family and decision maker; this plays an important role towards how Walter treats others now that he holds himself to a higher standard. This theme applies to Walter when the chairman of the “welcoming committee” (115) named Mr.Lindner pays a visit to the family a couple weeks before they 're supposed to move into their new home in Clybourne Park. During this visit, Mr.Lindner makes the offer of the Clybourne Park community “buy[ing] the house from [them] at a financial gain to [the] family” (118). Mr.Lindner’s offer represents the racial oppression and how the white community looks down upon and doesn’t want African american people dirtying their communities.

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1123 Words | 5 Pages

He has a wife, Ruth, a sister, Beneatha, a mama, Lena, and a son, Travis. His ultimate dream is to illegally sell liquor with a couple of his friends so he can become the main provider for his family and give them a better life. Walter’s father has recently passed away and the family is waiting on an insurance check of ten thousand dollars. Walter says, “Yeah. You see, this liquor store we got in mind cost seventy-five thousand

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1096 Words | 5 Pages

Walter is a middle age that is ashamed of were he is inn life. When walter discovers that he will get 10 grand from the insurance company when his father died, he gets some big dreams about owning a liquor store. He belives that if they invenst all of their money into a liqoure store, that they will become rich and move out of the getoh. He is the only man in the house besides his son travis who is almost never there. So it is just him and 3 women.

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1664 Words | 7 Pages

He feels that if he cannot achieve greatness and get his family out of the slums of Chicago, then he has failed at everything. It not only concerns his family that he sees his human worth out of money, but it worries them because they are not able to trust him to be responsible and just when making decisions. While the Younger family wants to own a house and receive a stronger income, Walter is the only one who obsesses over it and allows it to alter the ways in which he treats important people in his life. Segregation caused dreams to become deferred, and weights were put onto the families during the 1950s. Due to segregation, they could not afford what white families could, and this was because they were paid less in the workforce.

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466 Words | 2 Pages

Despite the fact that dreaming of a liquor store is shallow, Walter’s motivation to be able to support his family helps reconcile his somewhat immoral hopes. Later, Walter shows the idiocy of his plan to own a liquor store when he gets drunk. In act 2, scene 2, Walter borrows Willy Harris’s car and drives around Chicago for two days, then “just walked”, and finally “went to the Green Hat” (2.2 105). Through his actions, Walter shows that he is immature and cares more about pretending to be rich than his job that would allow him to provide for his family.

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1278 Words | 6 Pages

Walter uses his imagination to give himself certain qualities,

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