“Does it shrivel up like a raisin in the sun?' Lorraine Hansberry answers this Hughes’s question through play. The title of Hansberry’s play makes a direct reference to the Langston Hughes poem, “A Dream Deferred.' “What happens to a dream deferred?' asked Hughes. With thinking of the Langston Hughes poem from which the title of this play was taken, the key concept of dreams deferred comes to mind. Each person’s dream serves an important conceptual function, for example, aspiration, motivation, or direction for the character however, the different dreams also divide the characters, creating conflict amongst them. Of the three main characters Mama (Lena Younger), Beneatha, and Walter one wants to move to a bigger home, one wants to attend medical school, and the other wants to rise above his conditions though he does not necessarily have a plan to do so.

Each of the characters in the Younger family was trying to escape reality byways of them each having their own particular individual dream. Dreams are like a defense mechanism of using fantasy to try to escape a situation, which represents the eagerness or desperation to change life's ever-changing circumstances. With a people always being put down and never seeming to get a leg up, their only hope was to dream.

This is a direct description of how the Younger family in the play A Raisin in The Sun written by Lorraine Hansberry felt. Even though slavery had been abolished, colored people were not treated equally. During this period, racial segregation was ubiquitous. The 19th century was a difficult time for a lot of people, especially colored people.

What happens to a dream deferred quote