Manhood In Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin In The Sun

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In the play, A Raisin in the Sun, the Younger family faces the struggle of escaping life in the lower class. Due to the passing of Mr. Younger, their family is granted a $10,000 insurance check. While this may seem as a solution to their financial hardships, it actually elicited conflicting ideas concerning how the money should be spent. Mama, wants to buy a middle class house while her son, Walter, is determined to invest the money in a liquor store. Finally, Walter agrees to grant his mother’s wishes and supports the family moving. Although Walter is the only man in the family, Hansberry does not show Walter fully entering manhood until he sets aside his own desires and becomes supportive of his mother’s wish to move. Walter becomes …show more content…
The emptiness in Mama’s heart is still aching from the death of her beloved husband. She wants nothing more than to see Walter become the man her husband was and help to replenish her heart with the love it has since been longing for. Mama: “Well- well- son, I’m waiting to hear you say something...I’m waiting to hear how you be your father’s son. Be the man he was...Your wife say she going to destroy your child. And I’m waiting to hear you talk like him and say we a people who give children life, not who destroys them- I’m waiting to see you stand up and look like your daddy and say we done give up one baby to poverty and that we ain’t going to give up nary another one...I’m waiting.” (75) The fact that Walter has still not become the man Mama’s husband was, has slowly been breaking her heart over the years. She wants nothing more than for Walter to act in the way as her husband had. When Mama and Walter are discussing Ruth’s thoughts on getting rid of the baby, Mama repeatedly states that she is waiting for him to do things just like his father would have. Most importantly, she is waiting on Walter to fill the hole in her heart that remains from the passing of her husband. After Walter hears these sincere words from his mother concerning how much she misses the person her husband was, Walter finally breaks out of the oedipal
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