Troy as an Individual

Troy, the main character in Fences written by August Wilson, is portrayed in a very transparent way from the very beginning. While describing his personality, words such as prideful, loud, confident, direct, and stubborn come to mind. We see this while reading Fences through his diction and decisions he makes when hit with choices. Troy is a husband, former athlete, breadwinner, father, and friend.

The society that Troy is placed in expects a man to be the head of the household and a hard worker. Troy lives in a time of discrimination as well, which makes me believe that race also plays a factor on what the society expects of a man. This is where Troy emerges as a husband, breadwinner and father. He works as a garbage man, and in one of the earliest instances of the book we see the narrator state “Of the two men, Bono is obviously the follower (referring to Troy as the other). His commitment to their friendship of thirty-odd years is rooted in his admiration of Troy’s honesty, capacity for hard work, and his strength, which Bono seeks to emulate” (Wilson 1).  This quote illustrates the idea of what society expects of Troy (stated above). It shows that he’s committed to hard work, for one of the most obvious reason, to support his family back home.  However, we also see that when Troy is faced with the decision to give Lyons $10, his expectations also align with that of the society’s values (even towards his own family). “What’s the matter, you too good to carry people’s rubbish? Where you think that ten dollars you talking about come from? I’m just supposed to haul people’s rubbish and give you my money to you cause you too lazy to work” (Wilson 17).

Troy, although a strong-willed man, also shows signs of weaknesses. Gabriel, Troy’s brother, is a very sensitive topic that Troy reveals one of his weaknesses. Gabriel went into the war and almost “get half his head blown off…” (Wilson 28). This resulted in the government compensating Gabriel with three thousand dollars, in which Troy took. He feels guilty for this. “That ain’t what I’m saying, woman! I’m just stating the facts. If my brother didn’t have that metal plate in his head… I wouldn’t have a pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of. And I’m fifty-three years old. Now see if you can understand that!” (Wilson 28). He’s very transparent about this to Rose and it shows the audience that he doesn’t like the fact that he’s almost dependent on Gabriel.

Our current society arguable has parallel standards as the time Troy’s placed in, minus the race aspect. We still value men to be hard workers and for the most part, the head of the household. With this concept, I would say that Troy definitely lives up to the standards since we see that he is a family man and breadwinner.

Through Troy’s transparent dialogue and decisions in the book, we can label Troy as a hard worker and many more.