Park's Use of Foreshadowing

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      In her Pulitzer-Prize winning play Topdog/Underdog, Parks uses the literary device of foreshadowing in telling the story of the relationship between two brothers. The foreshadowing of Lincoln’s death by his brother Booth’s hand has many layers, from the obvious to the more personal and subtle. By the end of the play, Parks leaves the reader wondering whether Lincoln’s death was inevitable, no matter what choice either brother made.

      On the broadest, most obvious level, the “joke” of the brothers’ names, Lincoln and Booth—after President Abraham Lincoln and his assassin John Wilkes Booth—foreshadows Lincoln’s death by his brother Booth at the end of the play. To reinforce the historical connection, the brothers have as their first names what the historical figures used as surnames. There would have been little dramatic impact if they had been named Abraham and John.

      Abraham Lincoln was the 16th president of the United States and a crucial figure in bringing an end to legalized slavery in America. The Civil War (1861–1865) began in response to his controversial election because he was so staunchly opposed to slavery in America’s new territories. The end of legalized slavery (beginning with the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 and culminating with the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution in 1865) had a profound impact on the thousands of Africans and their American-born children who were discriminated against based solely on the color of their skin. The fact that the brothers in Topdog/Underdog are black Americans is both ironic and indicative of their difficult struggle to overcome their impoverished situation. One could also interpret their tough financial position as a way in which de facto discrimination continues to exist in the United States today. Their poverty is an additional overarching foreshadowing of an unhappy ending.

      John Wilkes Booth presents an even more interesting comparison as a namesake for the character Booth in Topdog/Underdog. John Wilkes Booth was a popular professional actor but still less successful than his older brother, Edwin, who was widely considered the greatest Shakespearean actor of nineteenth-century America. John Wilkes Booth resented his brother’s greater fame. He also deeply believed in slavery and conspired with others to abduct President Lincoln. When he heard news that General Lee had surrendered at the Appomattox Court House in Virginia in April 1865, he resolved to assassinate President Lincoln and his Cabinet. Although John Wilkes Booth was successful in assassinating the president, he was captured twelve days later by soldiers and mortally shot after refusing to turn himself in.

      The similarity between John Wilkes Booth and the character Booth of Topdog/Underdog is exhibited early on in the play by Booth’s emulation of Lincoln in three-card monte; Booth wants to play the same game as his brother but has never been as good. His jealousy is obvious to the observer and reader. At the end of the play, Booth lies and says that he and his on-and-off girlfriend Grace are going to get married. This declaration could be interpreted as another way for Booth to show his brother that he is the topdog since Lincoln’s marriage has failed. Booth even claims to have had sex with Lincoln’s ex-wife Cookie.

      Booth attempts to leave behind his past identity as the underdog, the younger, less capable and successful brother, by renaming himself 3-Card after the shell game three-card monte. Booth sees himself making a successful career hustling people for money, as well as obliquely claiming precedence over his brother Lincoln, who used to be a very good three-card monte hustler. Lincoln goes along with the name change and eventually lets Booth practice his card hustling on...

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him. Booth appears to be improving and even over-taking his brother in skill, but Lincoln is still more practiced than Booth at card handling. After leading Booth and the reader on for the whole play that he was losing his touch, in the last crucial card throw, Lincoln wins his brother Booth’s inheritance money. It is a classic shell game ploy. The foreshadowing of Lincoln’s win is subtle. He is talked about throughout the play as having once been the best three-card monte hustler; however he keeps losing to Booth and even appears distraught. He is so good at the game that he cannot stop himself from taking in his own blood relation.

LINCOLN: And thuh first move is to know that there aint no winning. It may look like you got a chance but the only time you pick right is when thuh man lets you. And when its thuh real deal, when its thuh real f—g deal, bro, and thuh moneys on thuh line, thats when thuh man wont want you picking right. He will want you picking wrong so he will make you pick wrong. Wrong wrong wrong. Ooooh, you thought you was finally happening, didn’t you? You thought yr ship had come in or some s—t, huh? Thought you was uh Player. But I played you, bro.

      Lincoln’s first career, hustling people for money, was a financial success but personal disaster. Lincoln made a lot of money, but the death of his partner Lonny made him turn his back on hustling: “I knew I was next, so I quit. I saved my life.” His current job as an Abraham Lincoln impersonator at an arcade, however, foreshadows an untimely end even more strongly. Not only is he named for and impersonating a president who has been assassinated, but his job is specifically to recreate President Lincoln’s assassination:

LINCOLN: This is sit down, you know, easy work. I just gotta sit there all day. Folks come in kill phony Honest Abe with the phony pistol. I can sit there and let my mind travel.

      When Lincoln loses his job, the reader might be tempted to think that he will be drawn away from what seems to be an inevitable death. But Lincoln is moving in a closed circle. He is drawn back into hustling by his brother Booth’s recent interest (and perhaps insistence that Lincoln has lost his touch with the cards), a need for cash so that he can get his feet under him and move out of his brother’s apartment, and probably also a need to feel good about himself by winning at something. Unfortunately, three-card monte foreshadows death for Lincoln as well. In scene 4, just before throwing the cards again for the first time, he says, “Link is just here hustling hisself.”

      In the opening scene of the play, Lincoln surprises his brother Booth when he walks in the door. Booth’s reaction is to draw his gun. This foreshadows and bookends the closing of the play when Booth draws his gun in anger against Lincoln and shoots and kills him.

      In this scene, the brothers are having Chinese food for dinner. The fortunes they open foreshadow events to follow:

LINCOLN: Whats yr fortune?

BOOTH: “Waste not want not.” Whats yrs?

LINCOLN: “Your luck will change!”

      Booth’s fortune is an oblique warning against killing his girlfriend and brother. These are relationships that are irreplaceable. Their abandonment by their parents, especially their mother, has been hard on Booth, the younger brother. In the play, he does not appear to have anyone close to him other than Lincoln and Grace, the two people he eventually kills.

      Lincoln’s fortune is a warning that the honest path he has been arduously following will soon take a turn. Fortunes are often ambiguous and easy to manipulate into an interpretation that pleases the recipient. In this case, although honest work can be unpleasant, it is the safest route for Lincoln to pursue—he should be wary of his luck changing.

      Another example of foreshadowing in the first scene happens when Booth threatens to shoot anyone who does not call him by the name 3-Card. Lincoln goes along with this for most of the play but slips up twice near the end, once in scene 5 and once in scene 6. One could also interpret Grace’s death at Booth’s hand as a result of her refusal to accept Booth’s new guise as an up-and-coming three-card monte hustler, although this all happened off-stage and readers only have Booth’s version of events to go on.

      A strong example of foreshadowing in the first scene is when Lincoln sings the song he made up in his head while at work. The song has a classic blues rhythm and encapsulates his sad life, talking about how his parents have left him, he has no money, no home, his “best girl” has thrown him out, and his “favorite horse” (Lonny) has been ground into meat. In the final lines of the song, Lincoln foreshadows his own death, building as well upon the fortune he got at dinner:

My luck was bad but now it turned to worse

Dont call me up a doctor, just call me up a hearse.

      In scene 3, Booth and Lincoln talk about Lincoln’s job. Booth is fascinated that his brother has no problem letting people shoot at him all day long. “You ever wonder if someones gonna come in there with a real gun? A real gun with real slugs? Someone with uh axe tuh grind or something?” This line of questioning is ironic and foreshadowing of Booth’s passionate and possibly pre-meditated assault on his brother at the end of the play. Booth, as an underdog who wants to be topdog, has a lifelong axe to grind with his older brother.

      A stronger element of foreshadowing in this scene occurs when Booth urges Lincoln to practice having a more dramatic death in order to impress his boss and keep his job. In his excitement, he yells, “And look at me! I am the assassin! I am Booth!! Come on man this is life and death!” Here Booth is directly identifying himself with John Wilkes Booth while he urges his brother to perform a more dramatic interpretation of President Lincoln’s death throes. The comment that this performance is “life and death” is more true than either brother realizes. Lincoln does not return to the deadly game of three-card monte until after he loses his job at the arcade.

      In scene 5, returning home after losing his job, Lincoln slips up and calls his brother by his old name, Booth, rather than Booth’s adopted new name of 3-Card. Stage directions do not indicate that Booth notices but this still reinforces the foreshadowing from the first scene of the play when Booth declared that he would shoot anyone who didn’t call him 3-Card. Lincoln slips again at the beginning of scene 6, although he and the reader are not immediately aware that Booth is in the scene.

      Many clues in Topdog/Underdog foreshadow Booth killing his brother Lincoln. With so much stacked against them, including history (the Civil War, after all, has been described as the only American war that pitted brothers against brothers), poverty, gambling, and a dysfunctional family, could Lincoln’s death by his brother’s hand have been avoided? Perhaps if Lincoln had stayed away from three-card monte, then Lincoln may have survived. Then again, as the topdog and older brother, Lincoln—or just the idea of Lincoln, who was older, more successful, more confident, more comfortable with himself—may have been too much for Booth to live up to.

Source: Carol Ullmann, Critical Essay on Topdog/Underdog, in Drama for Students, Thomson Gale, 2006.

Park's Use of Historical References and Figures

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Topdog/Underdog is a play rich in historical overtones, yet these should not be confused with events that shaped the course of American social and political development during the years after the Civil War. Although the Lincoln assassination exerts a pervading influence on how the audience reacts to developments within Topdog/Underdog, the assassination itself is nothing more than an augury of the play’s ending. Historical fact serves as a backdrop for theater—nothing more—and the events that occur onstage result from a knowledge of family history that is repressed rather than acknowledged openly. Therefore, the historical figures of Lincoln and Booth should not be identified too strongly with the brothers who bear the same names. Rather than recreate a scene from history on stage, a scene which is remembered more for a single act of vengeance than for the events that preceded it, Parks chooses to focus instead on the dramatic possibilities inherent in a shared personal history, one which the brothers Lincoln and Booth bring to a denouement marked by violence and desperation equal to that of historical events.

      Parks draws upon her audience’s knowledge of history to establish an immediate conflict between her characters, for the play is a series of reversals wherein power is shared alternately by each of the protagonists. Most everyone who has received a grade-school education is familiar with the attack at Ford’s Theatre that forever bound the name of President Abraham Lincoln to that of his assailant John Wilkes Booth, but the relationship of victim and murderer, and the social issues that led to the assassination, should not be perceived as a template for understanding events as they develop between the brothers in Topdog/Underdog. The audience would be wise to remember that the brothers were named Lincoln and Booth by their father as a joke, one which is perpetrated upon anyone who interprets the parallels between historical fact and fiction too closely. A more appropriate analogy for the brothers’ relationship would be that between the biblical characters Cain and Abel, but then Parks is much too subtle a dramatist to resort to overt comparisons.

      If there is a connection between the play’s characters and recorded history, it is a symbolic, tangential one. In spite of Lincoln’s name, an association with The Great Emancipator that is made even more ironic when Link wears a top hat, fake beard, and whiteface, Link’s job impersonating the president at the arcade emphasizes the precarious state of Link’s employment rather than his holding a position of power. On the contrary, Link remains at the mercy of his employers, who eventually replace him with a wax dummy. The repetitive act of assassination that occurs when each tourist redeems a ticket symbolizes the static quality of Link’s life, which has become increasingly moribund since he accepted a “sit down job . . . [w]ith benefits.” Although Link has made a conscious effort to abandon the dangerous street life he knew when he was master of the three-card monte, this change forces him to yield to a form of inertia that ultimately breaks his spirit. Link’s job as an unsuspecting victim of assassination symbolizes his having become a victim of socioeconomic forces that render him helpless—a stationary target, in effect, which is something he never would have become had he continued earning his livelihood on the street.

      Rather than dwell excessively on the historical reverberations of her characters, Parks focuses instead on their shared personal history to dramatize an often ambiguous, and ultimately violent, sibling rivalry. In verbal exchanges that move from banter to accusation at a moment’s notice, pieces of family history loom large before the brothers and the audience, revealing allegiances that place Link and Booth in the roles of antagonists. For example, in scene 5, when the brothers discuss the circumstances that led to their parents’ departures, Booth observes, “They didnt leave together. That makes it different.” Booth and Link then assume that, despite the indifference between their parents, they had an “agreement,” by which they would each give a son five hundred dollars and then leave. “Theyd been scheming together all along,” Booth says. “They left separately but they was in agreement.” The brothers’ suspicions of a plot against them are ignited further when each reveals to the other that he was sworn to secrecy when he received money from his parent, and this revelation leads the brothers, now temporarily united, to speculate that perhaps their parents abandoned them to start a new family, one that would not include them.

      The knowledge of this suppressed history breeds resentment—and, ultimately, violence—as feelings of abandonment and questions about the brothers’ respective paternities arise. Even though the brothers have had to depend upon each other to survive, this fact, like the example of false domesticity their parents set before them years ago, does not mean that they must honor their responsibilities to each other indefinitely. Booth is already envious of his brother’s ability to throw the cards, and his envy intensifies once he fails to convince Link to return to his old ways. “How come I got a hand for boosting and I dont got a hand for throwing cards?” he wonders. Booth mistakenly believes that his life would improve if his brother showed him how to master the three-card monte, for then he would be able to win Grace’s heart and have plenty of cash with which to entertain her. Booth seeks more than knowledge from Link; he seeks freedom. When Booth fails to obtain the object of his desire, he becomes more frustrated and angry, his resentment building to a dangerous level: “Here I am trying to earn a living and you standing in my way. YOU STANDING IN MY WAY, LINK!” Booth’s frustration with his girlfriend and with his brother increases his desperation as it reveals a historical pattern, contributing to what appears to be an impulsive act in the play’s final scene.

      Furthermore, Booth’s feelings of frustration are exacerbated by the brothers’ mutual dependency, a form of symbiosis that is governed by Booth’s jealousy and impotent rage, and which keeps the brothers locked tightly within each other’s orbit. As the brothers begin to question their paternity and the reasons why their parents abandoned them, Booth struggles to find freedom while Link sinks slowly into despair. The pain Booth felt when his mother walked out on them has never left him, as represented by his refusal to spend his “inheritance,” for he seems to still hold out hope that one day she will return. Thus, Booth, like his brother Link, remains unable to break free from the hold of personal history. However, Booth reaches a point where he is willing to do whatever is necessary to change the repetitive pattern of failure his life has taken. In a deluded vision of marital bliss, Booth tells Link to leave (the room is rented in Booth’s name), even though Booth fears abandonment and the thought of living his life alone. When Booth’s plans again collapse, he chooses to face failure the only way he knows how—through an act of violence. Just as Booth refuses to give Grace the opportunity to dump him for another man by shooting her, so, too, does he prevent Link from mocking him further by pulling the trigger in a scene that transforms his father’s joke into a tragic prophecy.

      By revealing a family history that Booth and Link reluctantly acknowledge but do not fully understand, one which binds them inexorably toward a violent end, Parks emphasizes the drama of lives that are no less tragic than those of historical figures. The end result is a play rich with associations that simultaneously challenge and satisfy the audience’s expectations, creating two brothers who continue to live on in memory.

Source: David Remy, Critical Essay on Topdog/Underdog, in Drama for Students, Thomson Gale, 2006.

The Brothers in Topdog/Underdog

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Topdog/Underdog is a play about the tension and the contrast between two brothers. Each brother struggles with his own demons. Booth feels inferior to Lincoln. Lincoln is trying to live a respectable life, with a real job. Each brother preys on the other brother’s shortcomings, propelling this play toward its volatile conclusion. Booth seems to be meaner to Lincoln than Lincoln is to Booth, but Lincoln also has his dark side. Parks shows not only how each brother preys on the other, but also how each character is tormented by his own insecurities.

      Booth is introduced first, and Parks immediately establishes him as an unsavory, frustrated character. Booth reveals an edgy meanness as he practices his con game, alone in his room. While he sweet-talks and cajoles an imaginary mark (“you aint no clown”), Booth lets his meanness come out after the imaginary transaction, in the privacy of his room.

Sucker! Fool! . . . I bet yr daddy heard how stupid you was. . . . I bet yr mama seen you when you comed out and she walked away from you. . . . Ha Ha Ha! And 3-Card, once again, wins all thuh money!!

      Booth’s mean-spirited outlash directs the reader to wonder what Booth is so angry about. It sets the reader up for further revelations about Booth. Booth knows that throwing the cards does not come as naturally to him as it does to Lincoln. This effectively sets the reader up for the volatile last part of the play, where Lincoln laughs at Booth and Booth shoots Lincoln. Booth wants nothing more than the ease of making lots of money with the con game and making it as easily as Lincoln once did. Booth is upset that Lincoln will not throw the cards and pesters him relentlessly.

      Booth is also effectively revealed as a person who deceives himself. There are plenty of examples of this throughout the play. This portrays Booth as a character whose word cannot be trusted. Booth is continually backtracking on what he says, after Lincoln points out discrepancies.

Booth: You could afford to get laid! Grace would be all over me again.

Lincoln: I though you said she was all over you.

Booth: She is she is. Im seeing her tomorrow.

      Booth repeats “she is” and Parks runs the words together. The reader can almost hear Booth trying to convince himself, as well as Lincoln, that Grace really does want him.

      Booth’s insecurities are heightened when it comes to women, as shown when he continues to bend the truth about Grace. Booth says, “Shes in love with me again but she dont know it yet. . . . I got her this ring today. Diamond. Well, diamond-esque, but it looks just as good as the real thing.” The reader clearly understands that Booth is continually trying to con himself and his brother.

      If Lincoln was a meaner character, he could torment Booth regarding Grace. But Lincoln is usually gentle with Booth in these situations, even when Grace never shows up and the brothers wait all night long. Lincoln does not hesitate, however, to give it to Booth on another occasion, when Booth claims he had sex with Grace.

Lincoln: You didnt get s—t tonight. You laying over there . . . waiting for me to go back to sleep or black out so I wont hear you rustling thuh pages of yr . . . book.

      Booth also knows how to hit Lincoln where it hurts. He continually reminds Lincoln that Lincoln is degrading himself by dressing up in whiteface to get “shot” everyday in a reenactment of Abraham Lincoln’s assassination. Even though Lincoln tries to find some redemption in his job (“People know the real deal. When people know the real deal it aint a hustle”), Booth tells him that he “aint living.”

      The terrible irony at the end of the play is that Lincoln’s “assassination” comes true, at the hands of his brother. The symbolism of Abe Lincoln’s assassination is chillingly apparent. Lincoln’s arcade job may well represent another kind of symbolism, the suggestion of a man slowly dying a little every day, having to do a degrading, low paying job and impersonate a white man. The man that talks to Lincoln at the arcade alludes to this when he says, “Does thuh show stop when no ones watching or does the show go on?”

      All of Booth’s actions are driven by his rampant insecurities. He is the younger brother. He does not have a real job nor does he have the ability to con people like his brother. Because of his inferiority complex, Booth is caught between trying to impress his brother by shoplifting fancy clothes or by one-upping him by reminding Lincoln that he slept with Lincoln’s wife.

      Booth is manipulative and works this skill effectively on his brother. At one point, Booth angrily shouts at Lincoln, accusing him of denying Booth success since Lincoln will not teach Booth about the cards.

Booth: Here I am interested in an economic opportunity, willing to work hard, willing to take risks and . . . all you can tell me is how you dont do no more what I be wanting to do. Here I am trying to earn a living and you standing in my way, YOU STANDING IN MY WAY, LINK!

      Booth’s manipulation is effective. Lincoln appears to buy into Booth’s accusation, and it helps lead Lincoln toward his downfall.

      It is to Parks’s credit that the play sustains such tension and energy. Parks pulls this off by showing the reader what shaped these brothers into the men they are today. The reader learns that the world has not been good to these men: their parents left them when they were boys; their parents had lovers on the side; and, no one had much money. Because of this past, Lincoln and Booth have had to do whatever is necessary to survive. Because Parks reveals to the reader what kind of circumstances these boys grew up in, the reader is able to understand and possibly sympathize with the characters’ actions.

      Lincoln is a different character than Booth in many ways. While Booth cut school nearly every day, Lincoln only missed it in an emergency, such as when their mother walked out on them. Lincoln had been married. Lincoln also stopped playing the cards, even though it made him more money than the arcade job. In every respect, Lincoln has made more of an effort at leading a respectable life. However, Booth knows how to zero in on the insecurities that plague Lincoln. Lincoln could not sustain a marriage, is working a dead-end job, and cannot get a woman. It is Lincoln’s awareness and frustration with his insecurities, along with Booth’s constant nagging, that drive Lincoln back to throwing the cards.

      The reader knows intuitively that things are going to begin spiraling downward in this play, once Lincoln picks up the cards. Parks has foreshadowed this effectively with Lincoln’s almost irrational fear of even touching the cards, earlier in the play. Like the recovering alcoholic who can never take another drink, the reader senses the dangerous tension and attraction between Lincoln and the cards. When Booth rips the fancy tablecloth from the makeshift table and reveals the seedy card table underneath, it is a fitting metaphor for Lincoln’s life. Lincoln tried to live a respectable life and hold a real job. But underneath the respectable veneer, Lincoln still has the heart of a con artist. It is Lincoln’s and Booth’s fascination with the cards, their ability to prey on each other, and their struggles with their own demons that drive these brothers on a path to tragedy.

Source: Catherine Dybiec Holm, Critical Essay on Topdog/Underdog, in Drama for Students, Thomson Gale, 2006.

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