I know I’ve seen the original movie of this at some point, but this is the first I have read this play. As far as English teacher in the United States goes, this play is about as famous and famously taught as almost any other piece of literature alongside Romeo and Juliet, The Crucible, and To Kill a Mockingbird. I think it’s an incredibly earnest and worthwhile book to read and to have students read. It’s the kind of book that teaches about race in America in a way that is both totally necessary and also often quite lacking, the idea that there is a life being lived outside the presence of lives of white people. There is still a white man in this book, but he shows up to perform a job, and is quite effective at it, to make sure that an upwardly mobile Black family knows that they had better be on their best behavior, but even then, they are still unwanted in a white neighborhood. Oh, but don’t worry, it’s not about race! As a Southern white man, it’s nice to remind everyone who likes to pretend otherwise that racism can be just as present and pernicious in the North (or here, in the Midwest in Chicago) as in the South, it’s just coded differently.The bulk of this play is about the various and varying relationships of the family, about what love and respect is, and about what matters to a wide array of different members of the family.
(Photo: https://www.amazon.com/Raisin-Sun-Lorraine-Hansberry/dp/0679755330/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=raisin+in+the+sun&qid=1573924662&sr=8-2)