In the play, A Raisin in the Sun, by Lorraine Hansberry, both Walter and Mama have great dreams and encounter barriers on the path to achieving their dreams. Walter unrealistically dreams of being a wealthy, important businessman, a dream that changes when he faces the barrier of his money being stolen by Willy Harris. Mama dreams of having a happy, loving family and faces the barrier of her children’s unrealistic dreams of wealth and power. For the majority of the play, Walter dreams of being an important, rich businessman, a dream that he will never achieve. His desire for money is first shown in act 1, scene 2 when he and Mama are arguing about money. When Mama asks Walter why he always talks about money, he responds by telling her “it [money] is life, Mama!” (74). This statement demonstrates Walter’s obsession with money and his belief that money is the most important thing in life, even more important than a family. Walter’s dream of riches and high social standing is fully shown in act 2, scene 2 when he explains to Travis that “after tonight…there’s going to be offices-a whole lot of offices…” (108). In explaining his business plan to Travis, Walter reveals his desire to have influence and be an important executive who is respected by all. Later, Walter faces a barrier in the form of Willy Harris stealing his money. In act 2, scene 3, Bobo tells Walter that their money is gone, and Walter is crushed (128). A few hours later, in act 3, scene 1, Walter comes to his senses and realizes that his dream was unrealistic and impossible to achieve because of his poor business sense; Willy …show more content…
Harris just sped up the process of failure. Because of this realization, Walter tells Lindner that “we have decided to move into our house because my father-my father- he earned it for us brick by brick” (3.1 148). Walter’s dream of power and riches morphs into a dream of being united with his family, and he is finally able to see that love will be better for his family than money. Hence, through Willy Harris stealing his money, Walter is able to change from a man who is materialistic and dreams of power and money into a man who dreams of what is best for his family, the same way Mama does. Mama too dreams of what is best for her family and wants happiness and love for them, but she faces the barrier of her children’s dreams conflicting with her own. Mama’s dream of happiness and love for her family is shown in act 2, scene 1 when she buys a house for her family to try to make them happy (91). Through buying the house, Mama shows that she cares more about her family than anything else, because instead of using the insurance money she received after her husband’s death to buy something for herself, she uses the money to benefit her family. Despite her compassionate intentions, Mama faces the barrier of her children having different ideals from her. In act 1, scene 2, Mama acknowledges the barrier when she tells Walter that “you [Walter and Beneatha] ain’t satisfied or proud of nothing we done…you [Walter and Beneatha] my children-but look how different we done become” (74). Mama’s statement indicates that she understands that unless her children’s priorities change, she will never achieve her dream. She accepts that her children’s beliefs are different from hers but does not believe that Beneatha and Walter are beyond hope. When Walter comes home drunk and asks Mama to give him her savings to help start the liquor store, Mama agrees because she will “never stop trusting you [Walter]. Like I ain’t never stop loving you [Walter]” (2.2 107). Mama sees that Walter’s plans may go astray but trusts and loves him enough to agree despite the risk in an attempt to bring their family together. This determination to unify her family is what leads Mama to redirect her children’s dreams when faced with Mr. Lindner, allowing Walter to decline the offer of money in exchange for the house and finally be the man his father was (3.1 147-148). Consequently, Mama is able to change her children’s dream, overcoming the barrier that kept her family from happiness, and achieved her dream. Thus, Mama and Walter in the play A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry both achieve their dreams of happiness for the family despite the barriers of lack of money and conflicting dreams.
Walter’s dream morphs from materialism to happiness for his family, and this change allows him and Mama to achieve unity and overcome the poverty and division that inhibits
them.
Mama talks to Walter about her fears of the family falling apart. This is the reason she bought the house and she wants him to understand. Walter doesn't understand and gets angry. "What you need me to say you done right for? You the head of this family. You run our lives like you want to. It was your money and you did what you wanted with it. So what you need for me to say it was all right for? So you butchered up a dream of mine - you - who always talking 'bout your children's dreams..." Walter is so obsessive over money that he yells at his mom for not giving him all of it. He doesn't know that what his mom is doing is for the family. He thinks that having money will make the family happy, when in reality the family doesn't need anymore than what they have to be happy.
that a discontented individual is often unable to take ownership of his life until he realizes that he must set a good example for his children. Walter is a protagonist who seems to only care about himself. He is really dependent on his mama's huge insurance check. Walter wants his mama's check so he and Willy Harris can open up a bar. This character continues to go down the wrong path until something tragic happens.
Walter wants financial freedom, he doesn't want just enough money to provide for his family, but rather he tells his mother "I want so many things. " Walter is materialistic and greedy, corrupted by a superficial “American dream”. Walter has no desire to find out about himself through his African American heritage. He believes he can define himself through money, money is everything to this man.
Dreams in A Raisin in the Sun & nbsp; Lena, Walter, Ruth, and Beneatha Younger all lived under the same roof, but their dreams were all different. Being the head of the household, Lena dreamed of the dreams of her children and would do whatever it took to make those dreams come true. Walter, Lena's oldest son, set his dream on the liquor store that he planned to invest with the money of his mother. Beneatha, on the other hand, wanted to become a doctor when she got out of college and Ruth, Walter's wife, wanted to be wealthy. " A Raisin in the Sun" was a book about "dreams deferred", and in this book that Lorraine Hansberry had fluently described the dreams of the Younger family and how those dreams became "dreams deferred." & nbsp; Lena Younger, Walter and Beneatha's mother, was a widow in her early sixties who devoted her life to her children after her husband's death.
In A Raisin in the Sun, a play by Lorraine Hansberry, Ruth and Beneatha both have great dreams but encounter at least one barrier to their success. Ruth’s dream is to have a happy and loving family, and Walter is her barrier. Beneatha’s dream is to become a doctor, but she is dependent on others to fulfill her dream.
In act one of the play, Walter proclaims that “money is life”(Hansberry 74) , meaning that one’s success was defined by how much money he or she had. Throughout the play, Walters and Beneatha’s views on wealth clash because according to Walter, money is the answer to all of their issues while Beneatha constantly reminds him that the money was mama’s and she could do whatever she wants with it whenever he pressed on about buying the liquor store. In scene two of act two, after mama gives Walter the money, Walter explains to his son Travis in a long speech how he will invest the money and what kind of life they will live once the business is successful, this also included sacrificing Beneatha’s school money. This speech also shows Walters “American Dream”. Unfortunately, Walter trusted the wrong man with his money and ended up losing it all. He fails to start the business he had his heart set on and the family ends up moving into Clybourne
The issue is whether Walter can distinguish between a fantasy of reality and a dream deferred. Essentially this play can be regarded as the mid-life crisis of Walter Lee Younger, passionate about his family, ambitious, and bursting with energy and dreams. Walter cares about his family, and he hopes that buying the liquor store will be a brighter future for Travis. ? And-and I?ll say, all right son-it?s your seventeenth birthday, what is it you?ve decided?.Just tell me where you want to go to school and you?ll go. Just tell me, what it is you want to be?
Primarily, in A Raisin in the Sun Walter is an example of one struggling to achieve their dream or desire. Walter serves as the hero and villain of the play due to the actions he takes revolving his dream. “Walter, who firmly believes in the American Dream of economic independence, wants to own his own business, and a liquor store, because he despairs over what he perceives to be his inability to support the family and to provide for his son’s future” ( __ __ ). Walter’s dream is to be sole the provider for his household and give his family a better life. He plans by doing this through a liquor store investment with the insurance money given to Mama from Big Walters death. “In the play Walter loses much of the insurance money that he planned to invest on a liquor store to a con artist” ( ___ ___ ). Walter’s decision on investing in a liquor store turns out to be a horrific choice. In the play although Walter is regretfully deceived and looked down upon as a result of the liquor store ambition, he makes up for it by at the end finally reaching his manhood. During the time of the play the husband of the family is mainly the sole provider for the family. In the case of the play, Walters mother is the sole provider for the family. Walter strives to be the “man” of the house.“A job. (Looks at her) Mama, a job? I open and close car doors all day long. I drive a man around in his limousine and I say, “Yes, sir; no, sir; very good, sir; shall I take the Drive, sir?” Mama, that ain’t no kind of job. That ain’t nothing at all. (Very quietly) Mama, I don’t know if I can make you understand” ( Hansberry , Pg.73). “Walter minimizes the position of a car driver because to him it diminishes his manhood and his sense of individual worth.
The dreams of Walter, Beneatha, and Mama in Lorraine Hansberry’s "A Raisin in the Sun", may take longer than expected, change form, or fade. Even if dreams seem to never get closer, one should never give up. Without something to work towards, society would just dry up, like a grape in the sun.
Living in a society where the fulfillment of dreams is based upon material wealth, the Younger family strives to overcome their hardships as they search for happiness. As money has never been a way of life for the family, the insurance check's arrival brings each person to see the chance that their own dreams can become reality. Whether in taking a risk through buying a "little liquor store" as Walter wishes to do or in -"[wanting] to cure" as Beneatha dreams, the desires of the family depend upon the fate of Mama's check. In the mind of Walter Lee Younger, the check is the pinnacle of all, dominating his thoughts, as he does not wait a second before "asking about money "without" a Christian greeting." He cannot see beyond the fact that he "[wants] so many things" and that only their recently acquired money can bring them about. The idea of money and being able to hold it "in [his] hands" blinds him from the evils of society, as he cannot see that the Willy Harris's of the world will steal a person's "life" without a word to anyone. When money becomes nothing but an illusion, Walter is forced to rethink his values and his family's future, realizing that there is more to living that possessing material riches.
America, since its conception, has been known as the "promised land." America is where one goes to escape persecution or achieve a dream that would be hard or impossible to achieve in their current location. This is essentially the "American Dream." The American Dream is to be able to create a better life for yourself, or any life you want, no matter who you are or where you are from. Walter and Frederick have two very different approaches to their American Dream. Walter's drive for money consumes him and complicates his relationship with his family while Frederick's passion for reading made him a more intelligent slave. The lives of the two men had different outcomes, but followed the same ideal of the American Dream.
A Raisin in the Sun is set in the South of Chicago in the 1950’s and portrays the lives of an African-American family, the Youngers, who like many other African-American families migrated from the South to the North to leave behind the social, economic and educational oppression. Unfortunately this is no different in the North. In the play it is seen how Mama solely believes that the meaning of life is freedom and Walter, her son, believes that money is life. Both these characters have conflicting ideas on what they perceive life’s meaning to be. These ideas will be closely analysed, with evidence from the text, to illustrate why they are relevant to Mama and Walter. The function of time will be closely analysed as well to show how over the course of a few weeks it influences their particular meanings of life. I agree with Mama saying that their interpretations of life are due to intergenerational differences, and not on what Walter suggests about life always being about money. The aspect of the deferred American dream, which I feel is a central problem in the play, will also be dealt with in relation to Mama and Walter’s dreams and how time functions in relation to this.
Walter is Mama’s oldest son. His dreams are to be wealth but at the same time wanting to provide for his family. His own personal dream is to open liquor store with his money he receives from Mama.
Every human has dreams, whether it be a doctor or a store-owner and to initiate and achieve these goals money is the biggest factor. Lorraine Hansberry’s central idea of her play A Raisin in the Sun set in the 1950s are money controls our dreams. The character’s aspirations are achieved through finances in which they lack until given a security check following their father’s death. Money controls the dreams of Walter, who wants to become a business owner, Beneatha who dreams of being a doctor, and Mama’s dream of owning a home. Walter is a man who dreams of becoming a business owner but lacks the finance needed to achieve these dreams until the security check.
Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun is a play about segregation, triumph, and coping with personal tragedy. Set in Southside Chicago, A Raisin in the Sun focuses on the individual dreams of the Younger family and their personal achievement. The Younger's are an African American family besieged by poverty, personal desires, and the ultimate struggle against the hateful ugliness of racism. Lena Younger, Mama, is the protagonist of the story and the eldest Younger. She dreams of many freedoms, freedom to garden, freedom to raise a societal-viewed equal family, and freedom to live liberated of segregation. Next in succession is Beneatha Younger, Mama's daughter, assimilationist, and one who dreams of aiding people by breaking down barriers to become an African American female doctor. Lastly, is Walter Lee Younger, son of Mama and husband of Ruth. Walter dreams of economic prosperity and desires to become a flourishing businessman. Over the course of Walter's life many things contributed to his desire to become a businessman. First and foremost, Walter's father had a philosophy that no man should have to do labor for another man. Being that Walter Lee was a chauffeur, Big Walter?s philosophy is completely contradicted. Also, in Walter?s past, he had the opportunity to go into the Laundromat business which he chose against. In the long run, he saw this choice was fiscally irresponsible this choice was. In Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun, Walter Lee's dreams, which are his sole focus, lead to impaired judgement and a means to mend his shattered life.