Lorraine HansberryAuthor of A Raisin in the Sun

May 19, 1930-January 12, 1965

Early Life

• Born in Chicago in May of 1930.

• Her parents were well educated and successful.

• She lived in Chicago’s Southside in an African American neighborhood.

During this era…• Segregation was still legal and widespread

throughout the South.

• Northern states had no official policy, but most were generally segregated.

• Chicago was strictly divided among African American and white neighborhoods.

• Hansberry’s family was one of the first to move into a white neighborhood.

On a Raisin in the Sun

• Recognizably autobiographical

• Realistic portrait of African American life

• Opened as a play in 1959

• It was met with great praise from African American and white audiences.

• Won several awards

The 1950s

• An age of complacency and conformism

• Symbolized the growth of suburbs and commercial culture

• The ideas of the happy housewife and African Americans content with the inferior status placed on them by society

• This resulted in public resentment which led to the civil rights and feminist movements of the 1960s.

What is the American Dream?

In her play Hansberry explored…

• Poverty

• Discrimination

• African American racial identity

• Oppressive white community of 1950s America

• Feminism

• Abortion

• DREAMS (VERY IMPORTANT)

Dreams

• Dreams are CRUCIAL.• They motivate and drive the

main characters.• They function in positive ways by

lifting their minds from tough work and life.

• They also function in negative ways by creating more dissatisfaction.

• Most of this is due to emphasis on materialistic goals rather than on pride and happiness.

A Note on the Title of the Play

• Taken from a line in the 1951 Langston Hughes’ poem, “Harlem”

• This poem was written after the Great Depression crushed the Harlem Renaissance and devastated African American communities.

• The poem captures the tension between the need for African American expression in the oppressive environment of white America.

“Harlem”Langston Hughes

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore— And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over— like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

Thoughts….

• Hughes asked whether a “dream deferred” withers up like a raisin in the sun? These thoughts as well as Hansberry’s confront the racist and dehumanizing attitude prevalent in the American society.

Hansberry’s Legacy

• Sadly, Hansberry died at the young age of 34 after a courageous battle with cancer, yet her fight for equality lives on through the power of her words in A Raisin in the Sun.