Conflict In The Play Fences

August Wilson’s play Fences depicts the life of an average African American family during the late 1950’s. Discrimination towards African American people still played a role in society during that time. In an interview with the New York Times, Hansberry stated the purpose of the play was to “show the many gradations of even one Negro family, the clash of the old and the new, but most of all the unbelievable courage of the Negro people”. August Wilson’s plays provide the same intent as Hansberry hoped for. Wilson’s play provides details about three generations of struggle that haunted an African American family. There was a cycle of hatred towards the fathers of the families due to the conditions they faced. Conflict occurred when young and …show more content…
There was a negative relationship between the males in the family due to outside forces. African Americans were placed in the misted of oppression, they struggles reflected there on there life. Men had to be these strong leaders for their families, showing them tough love as means of survival. Troy was the main character of the play and his relationships with his children and father shows the clash of the old and new. Tory had a strenuous relationship with his father, and could not bare to live with him after the age of fourteen. He remembers how his father would treat him and his siblings. Tory felt that his dad cared that his kids could walk so they could work. Troy felt that the actions of his dad could have been better, but at least his father felt a responsibility towards his kids. Troy’s mother walked out on him and never returned his father did not. Troy’s father went through a lot of women because he was mean. Troy’s father was a sharecropper, that’s all he knew how to do, he was a trapped anger man that no one desired to be around. When Troy left at the age of fourteen it was because of an altercation they had. Troy’s father was going to rape a girl he had been messing with, and this is when he became a man. He had to stand up to his father, after that he knew it was time get his own …show more content…
Wilson told the story of three generations of strong black males. Wilson provided viewers with the struggles that came along with generational differences. The oppression of black males caused tension in the homes, black men had to be headstrong and the head of the house. The cycles continued among the family when the boys would become men. As a man they wanted to be better than their fathers, he gave an example of black families sticking together. Even though the relationships of these men were strained they did not run out on their families. No matter their situation they were going to be in a place where they could provide for their families. In the end both Tory and Cory became better men because they learned from there