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compare and contrast pessimistic and optimistic
compare and contrast pessimistic and optimistic
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Optimism or Pessimism in A Raisin in the Sun
“Is your glass haft empty or haft full?” This saying perfectly describes what optimism opposed to pessimism is. Some people always see their glass haft empty, others haft full. The majority of people see their glass haft full some days and on other days haft empty. Our outlook on life is intimately related to the situation we are in and whether or not we believe we can get through the hard times. In the play A raison in the sun certain characters are more optimistic than others. Some of them are always optimistic whereas others have their ups and downs. Sometimes they are optimistic and on other days they are not.
Mama is a good example of an extremely optimistic character in the play. She always sees the best of every situation. At times the situation may seem completely hopeless to the audience. Yet, she never gives up. Mama has always dreamed of owning a house, she has always wanted to move her family out of the “ghetto”. Finally, she gets the chance to do so; she gets an important amount of money from the insurance company. She decides to use that money to make a down payment on a house. But her dreams are rapidly crushed; her son, Walter, has lost all of the money in an investment. Although she is extremely angry at first she does not give up. She decides that perhaps they can clean up the place they currently live in. They can add new furniture and perhaps even new curtains. The following quote perfectly illustrative Mama’s optimism: “I sees things differently now. Been thinking ‘bout some things we could do to fix this place up some. […] Why this place be looking fine. Cheer us all up so that we forget trouble ever come… […] Sometimes you just got to know when to give up some things… and hold on to what you got …” (p140) Mama is a really strong and important character in the play. Due to her hopefulness she is able to hold her family together till the end.
Beneatha on the other hand is more of a realistic character. She is optimistic some days and pessimistic on others. Beneatha is optimistic in the sense that she is a colored woman living in the ghetto and still, she strives and dreams to be a doctor.
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini is a story of two Afghan women, from seemingly different backgrounds, whose paths cross and lives are changed by each other. Although it may seem like this story is one of resilience and optimism, A Thousand Splendid Suns is clearly a story that represents pain and hopelessness.
Mama, as a member of an older generation, represents the suffering that has always been a part of this world. She spent her life coexisting with the struggle in some approximation to harmony. Mama knew the futility of trying to escape the pain inherent in living, she knew about "the darkness outside," but she challenged herself to survive proudly despite it all (419). Mama took on the pain in her family in order to strengthen herself as a support for those who could not cope with their own grief. Allowing her husband to cry for his dead brother gave her a strength and purpose that would have been hard to attain outside her family sphere. She was a poor black woman in Harlem, yet she was able to give her husband permission for weakness, a gift that he feared to ask for in others. She gave him the right to a secret, personal bitterness toward the white man that he could not show to anyone else. She allowed him to survive. She marveled at his strength, and acknowledged her part in it, "But if he hadn't had...
The Play takes place during the 1950s racism was still very common for African Americans during this time. After the family receives the money momma decided
A Raisin in the Sun is a play written by Lorraine Hansberry. The primary focus of the play is the American Dream. The American Dream is one’s conception of a better life. Each of the main characters in the play has their own idea of what they consider to be a better life. A Raisin in the Sun emphasizes the importance of dreams regardless of the various oppressive struggles of life.
...ccomplish this if they all understand what is important in life. All of Mama’s dreams are eventually recognized, although they certainly appear hazy throughout the play. The question about whether or not they should keep the house forms inside Mama’s head near the end of the play, but she quickly changes her mind. Mama never lost sight of her goals, no matter how hard nature attacked them.
1. Walter - His dreams of owning a licquor store conflict religiously with Mama's value system. The conflict between Mama and Walter is amplified by the fact that it is Mama's apartment in which the family lives and Walter is unable/unwilling to make decisions because Mama is so domineering. Ironically, it is the one decision that she eventually lets Walter make which nearly destroys the family.
A Raisin in the Sun, by Lorraine Hansberry is realistic fictional drama in which the play 's title and the character represent the play 's theme. The play focused on Black America 's Struggle to reach the American Dream of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness during the 1950s and the 1960s. The idea of everyone having the chance to achieve a better life should exist for all. Hansberry conceives her title using a line from Langston Hughes poem “A dream deferred”. The original poem was written in 1951 about Harlem. Hughes’ line from the poem state that when dreams are deferred “Does it dry up like a Raisin in the Sun”. This meant that they describe them as being small and already pretty withered. Hughes poem further suggested that when
Beneatha Younger’s dreams to be a doctor often contradict what other people think is best for her, showing that she is willing to take risks. Her relationship with George becomes tense when he discovers that she aspires to become a doctor. This is shown when he says “As for myself I, want a nice... simple... sophisticated girl... not a poet, OK?” George does not like the change that Beneatha advocates for. Another instance, when he says “It’s simple. You read books, to learn facts, to get grades, to pass the course, to get a degree. That’s all,
A Raisin in the Sun The creativity of Hansberry played a crucial role in the development of African-American drama since the Second World War. A Raisin in the Sun was the first play by an African-American author to be set on Broadway and was honored by the circle of New York theater critics. Drama of A Raisin in the Sun (1959) brought Hansberry to the Society of New York Critics Award as the best play of the year. A Raisin in the Sun shows the life of an ordinary African-American family who dreams of happiness and their desire to achieve their dream.
Poverty doesn't have to effect the people's personalities that I consumes like most of the Youngers. Mama, Ruth, and Beneatha did not let being poor make them envy any one who had money. Walter on the other hand was sick of the way he and his family had to live. He was fed-up and was desperate to make money any way he could think of for his family.
Towards the beginning of this novel, we meet the character Candide, who throughout the novel, Candide by Voltaire, was exposed to not only the philosophical idea of optimism, but also a dose of Pessimism and Realism. The question that arose from the novel however is what philosophical thought is right? It wasn’t until the last chapter where Candide says, “We must cultivate our garden,” which is essentially his own understanding of the events he has experienced. Contrary to all philosophical ideals he was exposed to, his experiences with the events that occurred leading him to believe that people are to take responsibility for their own actions and people shouldn’t question everything that has
A Raisin in the Sun is basically about dreams, as the main characters struggle to deal with the oppressive circumstances that rule their lives. The Youngers struggle to attain these dreams throughout the play, and much of their happiness and depression is directly related to their attainment of, or failure to attain, these dreams. By the end of the play, they learn that the dream of a house is the most important dream because it unites the family.
Mama is the head of the house. She dreams that her family will be happy and that her children have the best life they can have. She does what ever she can to make her children’s dreams come true.
Walter constantly criticizes Beneatha’s dream of being a doctor. He treats it as though his dream is anymore feasible. He’s portrayed by Hansberry to be fairly pathetic and helpless. It seems like he needs women to help him move into his
Beneatha is Mama's youngest child. She aspires to become a doctor. Mama wants Beneatha to become what she wants so she decided to put aside some of the insurance money for Beneatha's schooling. Beneatha struggles as a young independent woman who has yet to find her identity. She finds herself trying new hobbies and dating two very different men. During a conversation with one of those men, Asagai, Beneatha is forced by Asagai to realize that she is not very independent at all. In fact she has been depending on the insurance money to get her through school. After this realization, Beneatha gains thoughts on how to achieve her dream of becoming a doctor (Kohorn). She presents her mother with her decision of getting married and how she "plans to find her roots in Africa" with Asagai (Silver).