A Raisin in the Sun
A play by Lorraine Hansberry
About the Author
Lorraine Hansberry
 Born: May 19, 1930 in
Chicago, Illinois
 First black, female playwright
 Heavily involved in civil
rights
 Granddaughter of a freed
slave
About the Author
Lorraine Hansberry
 Not a typical upbringing
 Parents were well educated and successful citizens
 Outspoken civil rights advocates
 Dropped out of the University of Wisconsin after 2 years
 Moved to NYC to become a writer
 Became associate editor of Freedom, a progressive black
magazine
 Worked with W.E.B. DuBois
 Met Langston Hughes—an inspirational poet
About the Author
Lorraine Hansberry
 1953: Married song writer Robert
Nemiroff; divorced in 1964
 1959: “A Raisin in the Sun”
opened on Broadway
 1964: “The Sign in Sidney
Brustein’s Window”—the only
completed work produced in her
lifetime
 1965: Died on January 12 in New
York City of pancreatic cancer
Inspiration for “A Raisin in the Sun”
 1926-1948: Restrictive covenants (or
legal contracts) were used nationwide
to ban people of color from
purchasing homes in white
communities.
 1938: Lorraine Hansberry’s family
moved to an all white neighborhood
in Chicago.
 Led to a civil rights case
Inspiration for “A Raisin in the Sun”
 1940: 80% of property in Chicago
carried restrictive covenants;
forbidding black families to live in
certain Chicago communities.
 1940: U.S. Supreme Court case
Hansberry v. Lee
 Restrictive covenants were ruled illegal
in their neighborhood
 1968: Racially restrictive covenants
became illegal through the Fair
Housing Act.
 Residential patterns created by racially
restrictive covenants still exist today.
Inspiration for “A Raisin in the Sun”
HARLEM
by Langston Hughes
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
Like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
What happens when
dreams are ignored, or
postponed?
Hughes was addressing
the situation of blacks in
America, who had been
denied the American
dreams of education,
career and purchasing
power
A Raisin in the Sun
 Type of work: Play
 Setting (Time): Between 1945-1959
 Setting (Place): South Side Chicago
 Tone: Realistic
 Conflict: A working class family struggles
against economic hardship and racial
prejudice.
A Raisin in the Sun
 Themes
 The importance of dreams
 The importance of family
 The need to fight racial
discrimination
 Issues Addressed
 Poverty
 Race relations
 Gender relations
This was the first play
to portray black
characters, themes,
and conflicts in a
natural and realistic
manner.
A Raisin in the Sun
 Black vernacular is used throughout the play.

The dialect of English often spoken by African Americans in urban
and southern regions of the United States.
 Characterized by:

Diction (word choice)

Pronunciation (how a word is said)

Use of the word “be”

Tendency to delete the –s ending of verbs

Use of the word “done” to stress the completion of an act
A Raisin in the Sun
 Questions we will explore…
 How do dreams motivate people?
 Is it dangerous to place too much emphasis on materialistic
things?
 How important is family happiness?
A Raisin in the Sun
on Broadway
1959
2014
A Raisin in the Sun
on Film
1961
2008