Modern 1960s Father

I believe that Troy is as straightforward as a man could be in his time era. It consisted of the man going to work, working all day, coming home to a meal cooked by his wife, and then either having a nice time with his friends, or going home to sleep it all off, and repeat the cycle again. Sure, Tory may go a little overboard with his idea of fun, “I eye all the woman – Hell yeah, I bought her a drink!” (3), but nonetheless, he wants to improve the lives of his children, like any father would. He tried to show his son Cory that the world isn’t made of money, “Naw, it’s just two hundred dollars. See that roof you got over your head at night? Let me tell you something about that roof. It’s been over ten years since that roof was last tarred” (32), which then leads Troy into showing his son that you need to take care of the essentials in life first, before moving on to things that make you feel happy and give you luxury. He then later in the chapter talks to Cory about his job, and how he has heard that Cory is going to stop working and pursue his dream of becoming a professional football player, in which Troy was very displeased. He states, “You go on and get your book-learning so you can work yourself up in the A&P or learn how to fix cars to build houses or something, get you a trade. That way you have something can’t nobody take away from you. You go on and learn how to put your hands to some good use.” (35), so that Cory doesn’t end up like Troy in the fact that his dream was diminished because people didn’t want to see him up at home plate, swinging his bat. This is why, for the time era that Troy is in, and the hardships that he has to endure, he is a really good father to have around.

What causes happiness?

Some people in life may consider happiness to be a state of mind or just a minor occurrence, when in reality it happens all around us every day. In the playwright, Fences, we see that the main protagonist is not very content with his life as a mere garbage man, but tries to make the best of it. At one point in the story, Troy says that he had the perfect life, “I fooled them, Rose. I bunted. When I found you and Cory and a halfway decent job... I was safe.” (69-70). Unfortunately, something in his life was a either a little bit too dull, or he just needed some more excitement in his life, “Then when I saw that gal… she firmed up my backbone. And I got to thinking that if I tried… I just might be able to steal second –“(70), or he was selfish for his own personal greed. Back in those days, happiness was given through booze, baseball and in Troy’s case, having an affair with another woman.

Now how does society treat happiness? Society treats happiness about the people you spend time with, or the memories that you make. Happiness correlates with how you want to make the best in your life worth something. Giving back to a homeless shelter or even cleaning up our streets from the trash and garbage careless people throw down is how some people gain confidence and boosts their happiness. Other people gain happiness through the possessions that you receive, such as the dog you always wanted, or that new car come around Christmas time. In the playwright, Troy was happier to be able to keep the roof over his head and provide for his family than buy a TV, “Two hundred and sixty four dollars… cash money. While you thinking about a TV, I got to be thinking about the roof… and whatever else go wrong around here.” (32), which he believes is an immediate concern and does it for his family to provide and take care of them.

Both of these perspectives correlate with each other, as both of them have to do with either providing for your family, or making the best of your life while you are here on Earth. They differ in the fact that Troy just has the wrong way of thinking about happiness. He thinks that happiness is the feeling of actually being happy, but in retrospect happiness can be fixing that roof, or spending time with your wife, kids and friends. He tries so hard to make all of their problems go away, when he should honestly just have Rose’s mindset of only crossing bridges when they get to them, and not letting the continued stress of keeping the family afloat get to him so hard, that he has to find happiness away from his family.

Empowerment in our Culture and Society

August Wilson's legacy starts off with how he got started as a student of culture. When he was in the 9^th Grade of High School, he wrote a paper. His teacher gave him two grades, one an A+ and one an F. The teacher said that if he can prove if he wrote the paper, he would get an A+, if not, the F. I believe that this was the turning point in his life, when this possible discrimination against color comes out, he decided to leave school and become divulged in culture. He became a playwright to not only express his diverse culture, but also to show the struggles of real life, through the jobs that were prevalent to that time area, one play for each decade, spanning one hundred years.

Now how does this interlace with what his legacy was all about? Most of these plays weren’t about fictional characters or mythical beasts, they were about the working class. Life of a garbage man was what one of his plays focused around, which is not a very common play concept, but he was able to work it in, casually citing his own experience. He also was a man of the community as was spoken in the radio show by NPR. He brought them together through the race aspect by allowing literature that would interest that time era and the races that were established. In the article (Language, power, and the performance of race and class), they speak about how race is just an “identity “, and that if we were to remove the color factor, we would all be the same underneath. He also had brought a new concept to his language when speaking in the plays, which not all people could act out during performances. This was and still is discriminated against in the past and present through how some people think that when someone is illiterate, they will not know how to doing anything job specific, or that they are just bad at their job. In the prior article, they give the idea that if you were a doctor, and are not that literate, that you shouldn’t be a doctor, which is not the case. If you do the schooling and get your PhD, then you are deserving of that job because you did the work and had the determination to get to that point. He brings power to the equation by working with the community to help the minority of America feel as if they are not left out, and that they can make a difference in society.

All in all, August Wilson changed the lives of many people, by giving them the idea to think about how the other races and cultures of society have changed the world, through the power that we can make a difference in the world, the equality of race, and the literature that we can express to change the way people perceive different races, but also to give us an idea of how to change our society to give back to culture and our roots.