Lorraine+Hansberry

Lorraine Vivian Hansberry was born May 19th, 1930 to a middle class family in Chicago, Illinois. Her father Carl A. Hansberry was respected and revered member of the African American Community. He owned real estate, supported the advancement of the African American race, and ran for Congress as a Republican. Her mother Nanny Perry Hansberry taught at a local school, and along with her husband also took up an active role in politics. Lorraine was the youngest of her four siblings: Carl, Jr., Perry, and Mamie. In 1938, Carl moved his family to a white neighborhood that resisted the settlement of African American families. The move and later the settlement of the family was not easy, throughout much of their life in the community Carl had to defend his family from neighborhood racists and violent attacks. While sitting on the porch one day, eight-year-old Lorraine Hansberry and her sister Mamie watched an angry white mob gather in front of their house. The sisters retreated into the living room and were chased by a brick that crashed through a front window and lodged itself in the opposite wall. The brick narrowly missed Lorraine. Fed up with the attitude and atmosphere of the new community Carl Hansberry took his complaints against the restrictive black covenants to the Supreme Court. In 1940 the black covenants were declared unconstitutional in the Supreme Court case //Hansberry v. Lee.// Ultimately the case did little to reorganize segregation in the Chicago housing system, and Lorraine's father died battling the rough restrictions that impeded his family's opportunity. During Lorraine's years in Elementary school she observed her peers independence and personalities, which she stated inspired the personalities of many of her chracters. Throughout high school Lorraine showed great interest in writing continued to develop her interest into a gift. Her great love for literature is evident in her later works, her writing has been shaped by [|Langston Hughes], [|William Shakespeare], [|W.E.B Du Bois], and [|Frederick Douglass]. In 1946, Lorraine's father died before he could inact his plans to move his family to Mexico City, due to her two brothers facing difficulties with segregation in the U.S. Armies.

Lorraine graduated high school in 1948, after her graduation Lorraine is said to have studied many areas in many parts of the country, and for that matter the world. Among the places reported include: University of Chicago, The Art Institute of Chicago, The New School of Social Research in New York, in Guadalajara, and at the University of Wisconsin a predominantly white university, to study journalism, but was equally attracted to the visual arts. She integrated an all-white women's dormitory and became active in the campus chapter of the Young Progressive Association, a national left-wing student organization, serving as its president during her sophomore year. During her time at the University she saw a production of Sean O' Casey's play //Juno and the Paycock// about the problems of a down-trodden family in Dublin in 1922. It is supposed to have inspired her most well known and endearing play //A Raisin In The Sun.// Lorraine left Wisconsin after two years and moved to New York City in 1950. She took a job with //Freedom//, a newspaper founded by Paul Robeson. She soon became associate editor, working closely with Louis Burnham, who became her mentor. In 1952 she attended the Intercontinental Peace Congress in Montevideo, Uruguay, as a substitute for Paul Robeson who was not able to obtain a passport. During her visit she met many passionate and dedicated feminists from all corners of the world. In 1953 Lorraine met Robert Neminroff, who was a graduate student in history and English at New York University and also participated in politics himself, he was also a songwriter. It is suspected that this intullectual and political connection drew them to eachother. They met on the picket line protesting discrimination at New York University, the night before their wedding they protested the execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg suspected of espionage against the U.S. After their marraige Lorraine worked as a waitress and Robert as a songwriter gained success with his hit song 'Cindy, Oh Cindy'. In her spare time Lorraine worked on various writings, but devoted a large amount of her energies to her play, and various other works. During this time she was already an experienced writer and editor having published articles, essays, and poetry in //Freedom, New Challenge//, and a variety of other leftist magazines and newspapers.

Due to the revenue from her the her husband cowrote she was able to focus on writing //A Raisin in The Sun,// The working title of //A Raisin in the Sun// was originally 'The Crystal Stair' after a line in a poem by Langston Hughes. The new title was from another Langston Hughes' poem, which asked: "What happens to a dream deferred? / Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun, / Or does it explode?" From the time of its release audiences everywhere loved it, huge investors however were not interested enough to fund a full-blown production. After a short pre-broadway tour the play opened at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre in New York City March 11,1959 and was an instant success gaining large approval and popularity. In May 1959 the New York Drama Critics' Circle voted the play the best American play for a season that included works by Eugene O'Neill, Tennessee Williams, and Archibald Macleish. Hansberry became the youngest American to win the award. In 1961, it was produced as a film with most of the cast from the play, including Walter who was played by [|Sydney Portier]. The film also won an award at The Cannes Film Festival. The play was also made into a musical titled //Raisin.// Shortly after the films release Lorraine was in high demand as public speaker, accepting invitations to speak all over the country to aspiring authors of all races. Lorraine.'s second play //The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window// premeired and ended in 1964. Many critics stated the play was just a remodeled version of //A Raisin In The Sun,// the play ran for less than a year. January 12, 1965 Lorraine Hansberry died of pancreatic cancer, diagnosed in 1963, at the young age of thirty-four. Though her life was cut short, her ex-husband, whom she divorced a year earlier had also become her literary executor. Lorraine left behind a mountain of finished and unfinished works that represented the core of her skill as a literary genius. After her death her husband adapted some of her writings for the stage under the title //To Be Young, Gifted and Black//, a show that became the longest-running drama of the 1968–1969 Off-Broadway season and toured colleges and communities in the United States during 1970 and 1971. He also edited and published an anthology of her work (reissued in 1994) that included //Les Blancs//, a play about liberation movements; //The Drinking Gourd//, a television play commissioned by NBC but never broadcasted because of its controversial tones; and //What Use Are Flowers?// A fantasy on the effects of a nuclear holocaust. Among her other writings were a musical adaptation of Oliver LaFarge's //Laughing Boy;// an adaptation of //The Marrow of Tradition// by Charles Waddell Chesnutt; a screenplay based on Jacques Romain's novel, //__Masters of the Dew__;// and a critical commentary on Simone de Beauvoir's //__The Second Sex__//, a book that had significant impact on Hansberry's thinking. Until his death in 1991, Robert Nemiroff devoted his life to editing, promoting, and producing Hansberry's works on stage and television.

Lorraine may be most widely known for her playwrites, but her influence doesn't stop with her literary works. Throughout her life Lorraine also devoted her life to motivating people of all races. As a public speaker she conveyed her belief that art is social and that black writers must address all issues of humankind. As the civil rights movement intensified, she helped to organize fund-raising activities in support of organizations such as the [|Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)], called for the abolition of the House Un-American Activities Committee, and declared that President John F. Kennedy had endangered world peace during the Cubin Missile Crisis. Along with her siblings Lorraine established the Hansberry Foundation, an organization designed to inform African Americans of their civil rights, and encouraged their children to challenge the exclusionary policies of local restaurants and stores. In 1963 she left her hospital bed to give a talk to the winners of the United Negro College Fund writing contest, in which she delivered the phrase "To be young, gifted, and Black," which later became the title of her own autobiography. Prior to Lorraine's death she encouraged young children around the country to work hard, and to never give up. The blood,sweat, and tears would later manifest as success beyond dreams. To give an idea of just how far her influence and success went consider this. Over six hundred people attended Lorraine Hansberry's funeral in Harlem on January 15, 1965. The presiding reverend, Eugene Callender, recited messages from James Baldwin and the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. Cheney reprinted the end of King's letter, which read: "Her creative ability and her profound grasp of the deep social issues confronting the world today will remain an inspiration to generations yet unborn."


 * Works Cited:**

Byers, Paula K., and Suzanne M. Bourgoin. __Encyclopedia Of World Biography__. 2nd ed. 2005. 1-3. 17 Feb. 2009 .

Liukkonen, Petri, and Ari Pesonen. A site dedicated toLorraine Hanberry. 2008. Kuusankosken kaupunginkirjasto. 17 Feb. 2009 .

Reuben, Paul P. "Chapter 8: Lorraine Hansberry." //PAL: Perspectives in American Literature- A Research and Reference Guide//. 17 Feb. 2009 [|URL:http://www.csustan.edu/english/reuben/pal/chap8/hansberry.html].