Fences by August Wilson Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words - 1

Fences by August Wilson - Essay Example lives of the black Americans in the 1950s into the limelight, most especially regarding the concept of discrimination, which faces the black American first hand, may it be in the employment or the sports sector (Bogumil, 34). The discrimination starts with Troy himself, who is an excellent baseball player, but owing to his race, he never gets to be paid well for his talents. Despite the fact that he is a bit older for a professional baseball player, at the age of 53, Troy Maxson is mostly discriminated against due to his black race (Wilson, 22). Consequently Troy harbors the resentment inside him throughout his life, and at some point the resentment towards other races that discriminated against the black makes Troy prohibit his son Cory from engaging in professional football, despite the fact that he has a talent (Menson-Furr, 98). It is Troy Maxson’s fear that his son will also be discriminated against, and he would not want his son to go through the same experiences that he had to go through as a baseball player. The play, Fences, portrays many aspects of the society refusing to play within the limits of the fences established around social morals, but rather the tendency to cross over the fence and invade the territory of others, in a way that serves to damage the lives of the individuals whose lives are intruded (Wilson, 36). The ethical, moral and even legal norms would demand that talent should be the basis of benefitting an individual, where an individual with a better talent will earn more out of the talent, than an individual with less talent in the same field. However, the society has crossed over these norms and invaded the boundaries of social talent, by introducing discrimination as a factor that defines the way individuals benefit from their talents. Thus, despite the fact that Troy has a good baseball talent, he only earns menial pay from his talent, which is not the same with other individuals from other races, who have access to good teams and