Question

Instructions (How to get it done): • Research August Wilson and The Pittsburgh Cycle of plays. • You must have at least two outside sources that are academic and reliable. • Create an essay that is at least two pages and relates the following information: o An understanding of who playwright August Wilson is o How society is reflected in Wilson’s Pittsburgh Cycle of plays • This is a research essay and not an argumentative essay. • Include direct quotes and paraphrases from your researched information only as needed. • Be sure that you have in text citations and corresponding reference citations for all quoted material, paraphrased material, and newly researched material.

Answer 1

August Wilson was an American playwright and included a series of 10 plays, The Pittsburgh Cycle, for which he received two Pulitzer prizes for drama. Each work in the series is set in a different decade, and the comic and tragic aspect of the African American experience in the 20th century

The Pittsburgh Cycle:

Wilson's Pittsburgh Cycle also often referred to as his centurY cycle consist of 10 plays- nine of which are set in in Pittsburgh Hill district an African American neighbourhood.The plays are each set in in a different decade and are to sketch the black experience in the twentieth century and”raise consciousness through theatre” and echo” the poetry in the everyday language of black America'' His writing of the Black experience always featured strong female characters and sometimes included elements of the supernatural. In his book, he wrote” my mothers, a very strong principled woman. my female characters…..Come in large part from my mother. As for the elements of the supernatural, Wilson often featured some form of superstitions or old tradition in place that come down to Supernatural roots.One of his plays well known for featuring this is” The Piano Lesson. in the Play the piano is used and releases spirits of the ancestors. We wanted to create such an event in the play that the audience was left to decide what was real or not. He was fascinated by the power of theatre as a medium where a community at large could come together to bear witness to events and currents unfolding.

Wilson noted:

I think my place offers( white Americans) a different way to look at black Americans, he told The Paris Review.” for instance, in Fences they see a garbageman, a person they do not really look at, although they see a garbage man everyday. By looking at Troy’s life,white people find out that the content of this black garbageman's life is affected by the same things- love, honour, beauty, betrayal, duty. Recognising that these things are as much part of his life as there can affect how they think about and deal with black people in their lives .(1)

Although the plays of the cycle are not strictly connected to the degree of a serial story, some characters appear in more than one of the cycle’s plays. Children of characters in earlier plays may appear in later plays. The character most frequently mentioned in the cycle is Aunt Ester , a “washer of souls” she is reported to be 285 years old in ``Gem of the Ocean, which takes place in her home at 1839 and 322 in Two Trains Running.She dies in 1985, during the events of King Hedley II. much of the action of Radio Golf revolves around the plan to demolish and redevelop that house, some years after her death. Aunt Ester is a symbolic and recurring figure that represents the African American struggle. She is” is not literally three centuries old but a succession of folk priestesses .She embodies a weighted history of tragedy and triumph

Chicago’s Goodman theatre was the first theatre in the world to produce the entire 10 play cycle spanning from 1986 to 2007 .All shows were Hawali premieres, always extremely successful at the box office and garnered many local theatre awards for the actors and the organisation.

In the years after Wilson’s death the 10- play cycle has been referred to as The August Wilson Century cycle (2)and as The American Century Cycle (3)

References:

1. Isherwood, Charles (October 3, 2005), “August Wilson, Theater’s Poet of Black America, is Dead at 60”, The New York Times.
2. Wilson, August (2 October 2007). “August Wilson Century Cycle”, Theatre Communications Group- via Amazon.
3. “Listen to Playwright August Wilson’s American Century Cycle in its Entirety: 10 Free Plays