A raisin in the sun

Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun is a great example of American struggles in society that African Americans faced during the Civil Rights era. The play tells the story of the Youngers, a lower-class black family living in Chicago that struggles to gain middle-class acceptance. The Youngers struggle to achieve their dreams throughout the play, and their happiness and depression is directly related to the failure to achieve all those dreams. In the play, the Younger family represents the mindsets of three different generations. Hansberry’s play demonstrates how generation differences in one household result in personal conflicts. Walter and Beneatha, who are siblings, have dreams of rising above their socioeconomic situation. However, it is each one’s belief and how each views their situation that distinguishes them from one another.

In A Raisin in the Sun, Hansberry represents Walter Lee Younger as an ambitious but very unknowledgeable African American man. Walter Lee is a man who is angry and frustrated with his current position in life because he feels like a less of a man. He works as a chauffeur for a white man which has him dissatisfied with his own life. At the age of thirty-five, he can barely provide for his family. His dissatisfaction with his own life is shown when he speaks to his wife Ruth and says, "I'm thirty-five years old; I've been married eleven years and I got a little boy who sleeps in the living room and all I got to give him is stories about how rich white people live”. Although his family's financial situation is strained, Walter doesn't want his son to see him struggle. It is obvious that Walter Lee, who is supposed to be the man of the house, feels like a complete failure. He wants to emulate the lifestyle of rich white people and live like them. “I’m thirty-five years old”, his tone alone depicts that he is too old to not have accomplished anything valuable in life. He does not want to be a hopeless chauffeur for the rest of