Custom essays on Summary and analysis of “Fences” by August Wilson

The play starts and the audience is faced with a protagonist Troy and his friend Bono. On Fridays they usually gather to have a talk and drink. Troy and Rosa have a son, Cory, who was selected for a college football team. When Troy was younger he played basketball for the Negro Leagues and never had a chance to be called up to the Major Leagues. Sometime later it became possible for black players to enter the Major Leagues, but Troy was already past the stage for playing. Later on when Cory and Troy are building a fence, Cory tells his father unwelcome news that he has thrown up his job in a grocery store because of the football season beginning. Cory beseeches his father to let him play football, because there is a chance that a coach from North Carolina sees him on the field and teases out from the whole team. But in spite of the son’s burning desire to become a professional player a father refuses and expects him immediately to return to his job. Despite Troy likes baseball and considers it to be the best time of his ordinary life, he still cannot allow his son to experience the same sharp disappointment. As the play progresses we see Troy gains a suit at law and eventually becomes the first black garbage truck driver in the city. As in the first scene Bono and Troy meet and recall their childhood, fathers and their migration from the south to the north, when infuriated Cory comes back home after he has inevitable found out that his father has met a coach and told him that Cory is not going to continue playing football. A father calls his son’s insubordination a “strike one” against him. The fence is still being built by Bono and Troy. According to Troy’s words, Rose wants the fence because she considers that family members should be closer to each other. She highly appreciates family circle and wants her beloved people to be “circled” together. Troy tells Bono that he has an affair with Alberta. Bono promises Troy that if he finishes the promised fence for Rose, he in his turn will buy a refrigerator to his wife, Lucille, because she desperately wants to get it. Troy confides his romance to Rose. Rose in her turn blames him for taking but not giving. After Troy has twitched Rose’s arm, Cory steps for his mother. In fight between a son and his father Troy becomes the winner. After the accident Troy pointed a “strike two” on Cory.

Six month later, Troy is going to go to the hospital and to see Alberta. But she gives a birth to a baby girl and dies during childbirth. Troy directly challenges the Death to come and take him as soon as he puts an end to the fence building. A newborn Raynell is taken by Rose, who is pious and believes: “You can’t visit the sins of the father upon the child”, but refuses to remain a dutiful wife any more. Troy and Cory fall out with each other again. Troy asks his son to leave the house and provide himself. They could not get along with each other and without delay Cory abandons father’s house forever. Mocking at Death, Troy swings a baseball bat in the air. Eight years later Troy dies from heart attack and Cory returns home to his funeral. Cory does not have a wish to give last honors to Troy, but Rose says that not to be present on his father’s funeral does not make him a man. Eventually Cory and Raynell sing a blue song of Troy’s father’s. Suddenly Gabriel appears and tries to play the trumpet. Unfortunately the trumpet does not make a single sound. Gabriel feels frustration and misery. He raised a cry and the Heavens open wide. With his words “That’s the way that goes”, the play ends.