Fences - August Wilsons Play about Racial Discrimination - Research Paper Example

 Fences Exposes Boundaries It is a well-known aspect of American history that the South was the epicenter for the Civil Rights movement if the mid-20th century. A great deal of attention is given over to learning about the nearly universal racial discrimination accepted as a fact of life in the southern states after the end of the Civil War. Although black people had attained the status of free citizens, they were deeply resented in the ruined South and were still considered to be somehow less than fully human. This aggression even took official form in the adoption within many of these states of what are now referred to as the Jim Crow laws (Horton, 2005). What is not so readily recognized is that racial problems in this country had no established regional boundaries. Although the industrialized cities of the North offered greater opportunity for the black family, this was mostly only due to the fact that the growing factory-driven economy was in need of low-wage workers and black people were willing to take the jobs. However, just because they were welcomed by the factory in the capacity of intelligent machines, they were not necessarily as welcome within the greater society. Black people living in Northern cities also had to deal with a great deal of racism and lack of opportunity. Even though these conditions are not as recognized today because they never became a part of official law, boundaries set on black people in the North could be just as harsh as those set upon them in the South. These kinds of restrictions might have gone unnoticed and unremembered if it weren’t for black playwrights determined to remember their roots, such as August Wilson in his play Fences. Wilson exposes the hidden boundaries his characters encounter as they attempt to achieve a modest version of the American dream in the 1950s North in his play Fences through the clever use of symbolism. The concept of invisible boundaries blocking one’s ability to reach the American Dream is a central theme of August Wilson’s play Fences. The play opened in 1987, but its action is set in the 1950s. The story opens on a random Friday afternoon at a time when the main character, Troy Manxson, is waiting to receive his paycheck from the city’s waste removal services. As the play develops, it becomes clear that all of Wilson’s characters once had big dreams of their own that were each thwarted by a social lack of opportunity afforded the entire race. Troy’s dream is revealed as he talks with Bono about the constant ceilings that are placed over his head. The discussion starts when Troy tells Bono about their boss’s reaction when he asked why only white men were allowed the position of garbage truck drivers while he remained stuck in the lowly position at the back. However, even this aspiration is significantly lower than the dream he’d once tried to follow, being a professional baseball player at a time when black players could only play in the poorly paid Negro Leagues. Playing for a professional team would have afforded him and his family an entirely different kind of life, but he was blocked by segregation laws that prevented any ‘colored’ man from playing on a professional level. Told that he was just born too young in Act I, scene 1, Troy responds, “"There ought not never have been no time too early” (Wilson 9). Although he works hard and has intelligence and ambition, the color of his skin ensures he is given no opportunity for advancement at the workplace and he is never able to reach economic success. At the same time, he feels he has failed socially when his lack of education leads to his brother becoming incarcerated in an insane asylum. The action of the play demonstrates the slow progression of the family over time as the fence Troy finally builds for his wife eventually becomes a garden for his little girl by another woman to grow up in. Even as the fence comes to represent the slow attainment of the American Dream, piece by painful piece, it also demonstrates the unnecessary boundaries or fences that confined the black people in their poverty and ignorance. The physical fence in the play takes on a central role as it becomes the symbol of both hope and despair, making it in the big world and shutting the world out. Even though he doesn’t fully understand why Rose wants a fence, after all, she doesn’t have anything that anybody wants, Troy agrees to build the fence with his son Cory as a means of keeping everyone else out. At first, the fence-building project is greatly delayed as Troy first tries to talk Rose out of it and then only works on it slowly. “Troy delays building the fence, as though fearful of the restrictions it will place on him … Perhaps, subconsciously, Troy feels that the fence, while keeping his family within, might also keep him away from Alberta” (Pereira 49) and the sense of life he enjoys when they’re together. Thus, the unfinished fence is a symbol of Troy’s constant desire to escape the confines of the space the world has allotted him. Later, the physical building of the fence is used as a means of avoiding direct contact with the rest of the family as he and Cory get the structure up. Knowing he is only holding onto what remains of his family by a very thin thread, Troy decides to finish the fence as a means of staying out of Rose’s critical eye while still remaining within sight of the house. Just as Troy is beginning to understand how the fence might help him realize some of the comfort and security of the American Dream in the sense of ownership and belonging, though, it again becomes a symbol of separation when he and Cory get into their fight. As Cory walks away from the battle, Troy tells him all his things will be dumped “on the other side of that fence”, emphasizing the physical separation from the world that it represents again. However, the physical aspect of the fence is only the beginning. It is very early in the play that the audience becomes aware that the fence Troy is building is more emotional than physical fences. This comes out in his interactions with the other characters in the story. “He constantly criticizes the decisions that his two sons have made, which consequently push them farther out of his life. Troy was pushing his first son, Lyons, away by criticizing his decision to play jazz. He pushed his wife away by betraying her trust and having a baby with another woman and was holding Cory back from pursuing his dream to play baseball” (Kyes, 2009). In Fences, Wilson explores both the humanity of his characters in their normal pursuit of the American Dream as well as the boundaries placed on them as a result of the color of their skin. This is in spite of the fact that these characters lived in the Northern cities where opportunities were supposed to be available for all. What this story demonstrates is that while the black man may have achieved the right to work and earn a living in the North, the wages paid for the type of work he was able to do was set so low that he was forced to live at a subsistence level, never able to climb the fence to the next level. Having never gained the opportunity to ‘lay by’ anything for the future, the family’s growth toward achieving the Dream was snail-pace slow, measured in generations rather than lifetimes. In spite of this, Wilson demonstrates that the perseverance of the family, the binding connections they form through love and mutual responsibility, enable them to make steady strides toward a more equal future in which the Dream might be attained. In the end, the youngest child of the family is able to grow up playing in her own fenced-in safe yard, something her slightly older counterparts never had and symbolizing the hope of the race for the future. Works Cited Horton, Lois E. Slavery and the Making of America. Oxford University Press, 2005. Kyes, Ann-Marie. “Symbolism in August Wilson’s Fences.” Associated Content. (June 25, 2009). November 14, 2009 Pereira, Kim. August Wilson and the African-American Odyssey. University of Illinois Press, 1995. Wilson, August. Fences. New York: Theatre Communications Group, 2008. Read More