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1. 
   playsthething Teacher
   High School - 9th Grade

   eNotes Editor

   The setting of the play is the Younger family apartment.  It's a very crowded place.  Walter Lee and Ruth have one bedroom, Beneatha and Mama have the other; Travis is relegated to sleeping on the couch in the living room.  They share a bathroom with other tenants in the building.  They have lived here a long time, but all have versions of a dream of moving to a bigger and more sun-filled place, especially Mama and Ruth in terms of the latter dream.  The play is set in Chicago, in the late 1950s.  

   The family characters (referencing your second post) include:

   Mama/Lena Younger - the matriarch of the family, is preparing to retire from domestic work on the strength of the insurance check of her late husband, Walter Senior.

   Walter Lee Younger - her son, works as a chauffeur but wants to open a liquor store.

   Ruth Younger - Walter's wife, works as a domestic, is pregnant (but this is not known at the beginning of the play).

   Travis Younger - Walter and Ruth's son.

   Beneatha Younger - Walter's sister, goes to college, wants to be a doctor.

   Other characters include:

   George Murchison - a college boy who is dating Beneatha, painted as an assimilationist.

   Joseph Asagi - also a college boy who is dating Beneatha, from Africa, wakens Beneatha's interest in her heritage.

   Mr. Linder - representative of the Clybourne Park neighborhood association.

   Sources:

   http://www.enotes.com/raisin-sun/

   http://www.enotes.com/raisin-sun/characters

   http://www.enotes.com/raisin-sun/summary

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   Posted by playsthething on Thursday October 30, 2008 at 4:31 PM