A Raisin in the Sun

Never before has so much of the truth of black people's lives been shown on the stage in the entire history of the American theatre James Baldwin observed just before A Raisin in the Sun premiered on Broadway in 1959. Lorraine Hansberry's award-winning play about the hopes and aspirations of a struggling working-class family on Chicago's South Side resonated deeply with black America's psyche—and forever reshaped American theatre. The title of the play is derived from a phrase in Langston Hughes' poem Harlem which warns that if a dream is postponed it will dry up/like a raisin in the sun. The events of every passing year add resonance to A Raisin in the Sun said The New York Times. It is as if history is conspiring to make the play a classic.