Fences In 1965, August Wilson’s “Fences” was created as the fifth part of his Pittsburg Cycle of dramas of the 20thCentury investigation of the evolution of black culture (Gantt, 1; Gantt, 2). The play has an influx of symbolism and metaphors that tells the late life story of Troy Maxon and the family that surrounds him. Even from the beginning of the drama there is conflict and foreshadowing that can be attributed to his own belief that he has failed in life and that the world did not give him what he deserved. He believes that he has to go outside of the family to find refuge and that is how the story begins and ends. Using Formalistic analysis the essay will focus on the motifs that occur in each act and scene of the drama to build to the last scene and the conclusion of the play (Chapter 3, 37). The point of view through out the play is through the eyes of Troy Maxon as viewed by the audience. He is the lead in the drama, and all plots revolve around his life and his decisions, some good and others not so good. These motifs also give the audience an understanding as to the life of the African American, both male and female, in the mid to late 1950s and early 1960s. Life was getting better in the sense of gaining citizenship, but this was also before the civil rights movement and shows that citizenship did not mean acceptance or understanding of the assimilated African American culture, or putting into the open the injustice of the past (Burbank, 118). The second facet of this analysis is the combining of each act and scene through unity and relational issues and actions that keep the drama moving forward and keeping the audience intrigued as to what is to come in the future of the drama (Chapter 3, 40). Since Wilson loved to use metaphors, the relationship between the metaphors is as an important aspect as the metaphors themselves (Wilson, 479). The introduction to the drama reinforces the plight of the African American to prepare the audience. The audience needs to look at the drama from the 1950s based on the social and economic conditions of the African American in that decade. The African Americans of the 1950s were looked upon as less than citizens, and definitely the lowest of the immigrants that
were coming to America to find a better life. Many of the African Americans in the cities had migrated to the North, which instead of taking them in with open arms, pushed them aside and pushed them back, giving them only the basest parts of life.
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