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A Raisin In The Sun Literary Analysis

1365 Words6 Pages

Langston Hughes once said, “Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly”. What Langston Hughes is trying to convey is that a person who does not dream freely will be as impaired as a bird who cannot fly. In other words, this person will never reach his dream, let alone get from point A to point B. In Lorraine Hansberry’s play, A Raisin in the Sun, she attempts to tell readers the story of an African American family who similarly are having troubles fulfilling their dreams. Throughout the course of the play Hansberry utilizes historical facts alongside with personal opinion to convey to her readers the argument that people can still dream and hope despite their struggles. From start to finish, the play embodies the authors message, especially through the use of character and plot developments; consequently her theme is important to readers because of the fact that is can still …show more content…

However, it is with the help of these dreams that people are able to grow and overcome these struggles. Going back to what Langston Hughes voiced, it is now very obvious why people without dreams are like birds without wings. That is, a bird without wings will never be able to move from one place to another. Likewise in the case of the human with a dream he would be equal to a bird with wings because in this case that person would be able to get to places in his life. Given these points, do you think that people such as Martin Luther King Jr. would have been able to fight for African American rights if he hadn’t set dreams and goals for himself amidst his struggles? Yet alone do you think that our society would be able to grow past their old lives if they hadn’t set goals for themselves to achieve? If it hasn’t been made clear enough already, dreams are vital to the development of everyone no matter what the case may

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A Raisin In The Sun Allusion Analysis

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The play by Lorraine Hansberry , A Raisin In The Sun, utilizes the use of allusions in order to supply the reader with historical background. Allusions create emphasis in the play, this allows the reader to understand and appreciate the text. Within the small details of the play, the use of allusions deepen the contextual support of the text. While reading A Raisin In The Sun, various allusions appear throughout the play. These allusions reference the outside world, but also give emphasis on the importance of the piece of the text references.

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A Raisin In The Sun Literary Analysis Essay

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"I Know Where I've Been" by Queen Latifah In “A Raisin in the Sun,” Lena Younger, also referred to as Mama, is a character who embodies strength, resilience. Queen Laitifah’s “I Know Where I’ve Been” resonates with Mama’s journey and the struggles she faces. The song’s lyrics, “There’s a dream in the future, there’s a struggle that we have yet to win,” reflects Mama’s unwavering determination to provide a better life for her family despite the obstacles she faces and the challenges she faces as an African American living in a racially segregated society.

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“A Raisin in the Sun,” written by Lorraine Hansberry in 1959, was the first play ever produced on Broadway by an African-American woman and was considered ground-breaking for it’s time. Titled after Langston Hughes’ poem “Harlem,” sometimes known as “A Dream Deferred,” the play and the subsequent film adaptations are honest examinations of race, family, poverty, discrimination, oppression and even abortion in urban Chicago after WWII. The original play was met with critical praise, including a review by Brooks Atkinson of the New York Times where he wrote, “For A Raisin in the Sun is a play about human beings who want, on the one hand, to preserve their family pride and, on the other hand, to break out of the poverty that seems to be their fate. Not having any axe to grind, Miss Hansberry has a wide range of topics to write about-some of them hilarious, some of them painful in the extreme.” The original screen adaptation released in 1961 was highly acclaimed in its own right, and was chosen in 2005 for preservation in the United States of America National Film Registry by the Library of Congress for its cultural and historical significance.

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A Raisin In The Sun American Dream Essay

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