Albee and Twain: Demystifying an American Dream
Albee and Twain: Demystifying an American Dream
“What Happens to a dream differed? / Does it dry up /
like a raisin in the sun / Or fester like a sore- / etc. And then run? / Does it stink like rotten meat? /
Or crust with sugar over- / like a syrupy sweet? / Maybe it just sags / like a heavy load / Or does it explode?”
-------- Langston Hughes
American Dream was a term that first appeared in James Truslow Adams’s The Epic of America, where he states The American Dream is "that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement. It is not a dream of motor cars and high wages merely, but a dream of social order in which each man and each woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position” (Adams, 1931) It is this land; Twain throws Huck and Jim to endure the hardships of life, to experience the thrown-Inness of being born into the world unprepared, without choice. Long considered as a “quest for freedom”, Huck-Finn essentially is as M. Cox puts it “a flight from tyranny, not a flight for freedom” (Cox, p172-173, 1966). Freedom is essentially a relative term, and freedom may manifest itself in physical and psychological realms. Half of the world still considers itself honored under the nomenclature of “The Commonwealth”, illustrates the limitation of physical freedom alone. One dreams in order to maintain that freedom, but as Schumacher put it, “The greatest deprivation anyone can suffers is to have no chance of looking after himself and making a livelihood”, depriving one of one’s existence and consciousness of being free. (Kumar, p2672, 1991).
Being a Post-American Dream novel, Twain did not go to the extent to overthrow the entire socio-political system to emphasize the impossibility and superficiality of
“What Happens to a dream differed? / Does it dry up /
like a raisin in the sun / Or fester like a sore- / etc. And then run? / Does it stink like rotten meat? /
Or crust with sugar over- / like a syrupy sweet? / Maybe it just sags / like a heavy load / Or does it explode?”
-------- Langston Hughes
American Dream was a term that first appeared in James Truslow Adams’s The Epic of America, where he states The American Dream is "that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement. It is not a dream of motor cars and high wages merely, but a dream of social order in which each man and each woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position” (Adams, 1931) It is this land; Twain throws Huck and Jim to endure the hardships of life, to experience the thrown-Inness of being born into the world unprepared, without choice. Long considered as a “quest for freedom”, Huck-Finn essentially is as M. Cox puts it “a flight from tyranny, not a flight for freedom” (Cox, p172-173, 1966). Freedom is essentially a relative term, and freedom may manifest itself in physical and psychological realms. Half of the world still considers itself honored under the nomenclature of “The Commonwealth”, illustrates the limitation of physical freedom alone. One dreams in order to maintain that freedom, but as Schumacher put it, “The greatest deprivation anyone can suffers is to have no chance of looking after himself and making a livelihood”, depriving one of one’s existence and consciousness of being free. (Kumar, p2672, 1991).
Being a Post-American Dream novel, Twain did not go to the extent to overthrow the entire socio-political system to emphasize the impossibility and superficiality of