A Raisin in the Sun

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A Raisin in the Sun

• By Lorraine Hansberry

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HISTORICAL CONTEXT
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Racism and Segregation
Jim Crow Laws
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Strange Fruitperformed by Billie Holiday
Southern trees bear strange fruitBlood on the
leavesBlood at the rootBlack bodies swinging in
the southern breezeStrange fruit hanging from
the poplar treesPastoral scene of the gallant
southThe bulging eyes and the twisted mouthThe
scent of magnolia sweet and freshThen the sudden
smell of burning fleshHere is a fruit for the
crows to pluckfor the rain to gatherfor the
wind to suckfor the sun to rotfor the tree to
dropHere is a strange and bitter crop
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The Play
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A Raisin in the Sun

• Opened on Broadway on March 11, 1959
• Cast includes Sidney Poitier, Claudia McNeil, and
  Ruby Dee
• The New York Drama Critics name it the Best
  American Play of 1959
• Ran for nearly 2 years on Broadway
• Made into a film starring most of the Broadway
  cast in 1961

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Connection with Hansberrys Life

• Hansberrys father was a wealthy, real estate
  broker in segregated Chicago
• In 1937, her father purchased a home in the
  Washington Park Subdivision
• Washington Park had a restrictive covenant that
  said no black person could live in or own a home
  in the subdivision
• Washington Park fought Hansberry and they went to
  court in 1937

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• Judge orders the Hansberrys eviction on August
  19, 1938
• Hansberry appeals to the Supreme Court of
  Illinois
• The case of Hansberry, et al vs. Lee, et al goes
  all the way to the Supreme Court of the United
  States on October 25, 1940
• The U.S. Supreme Court deems restrictive
  covenants non-existant

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Hansberry Decision Opens 500 New Homes to
RaceThe Chicago Defender Saturday, November
16, 1940
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Iron Ring in HousingThe Crisis (NAACP
Magazine) 47.7 (July, 1940)

• NAACP estimates that 80 of Chicago is covered by
  restrictive covenants
• The iron ring of restrictive covenants which
  surrounds the Negro community has prevented its
  normal expansion in spite of the fact that the
  colored population has more than doubled in in
  the last two decades. Within the community
  practically no living units have been built and
  few new residences have been made available
  during the past twelve years.