Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Hansberry, Lorraine - David E. Ness

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DAVID E. NESS

The compelling thing about Sidney Brustein is that although political commitment is the overriding concern, by and large the play is not about political issues in the usual sense. It concerns a small group of rather ordinary people who face a variety of real problems in their lives…. Sidney, in the midst of this group, has more "social conscience" than any of them but is really not up to the role of ethical and political standard-bearer that he pretends. Until Iris leaves him, his awareness of social problems is limited to a sense of discomfort and disillusionment about the quality of urban life. He does not feel social problems as actually touching him, and he is not as yet, and has no reason to be, angry about the conditions of his life. (pp. 363-64)

The organization of the play is essentially the creation of a real world around Sidney for him to observe and draw conclusions from as he moves toward this final realization…. [It] is...

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1. Introduction
2. Brooks Atkinson
3. Tom F. Driver
4. Gerald Weales
5. Harold R. Isaacs
6. Stanley Kauffmann
7. John Cutts
8. Walter Kerr
9. Ossie Davis
10. Arthur France
11. C.W.E. Bigsby
12. Gerald Weales
13. Jordan Y. Miller
14. Martin Gottfried
15. Brendan Gill
16. Walter Kerr
17. Harold Clurman
18. George R. Adams
19. David E. Ness
20. Clive Barnes
21. W. Edward Farrison
22. Julius Lester
23. Bertie J. Powell
24. Copyright

1. Lorraine Hansberry