Gem Of The Ocean Play Analysis

In August Wilson’s Gem of the Ocean, he demonstrate many issues with authority figures abusing their power amongst African Americans. The setting of the play being placed in 1904, police in Wilson play such as Caesar reflected how police abuse their power in today’s society. Caesar, a black police officer in the play, demonstrates the issue of authority in today’s society abusing their power by exploiting the community, harassing African American people and taking innocent lives.
August Wilson was an American playwright who received two Pulitzer Prizes for Drama fpr the ten plays he had written called the “The Pittsburgh Cycle” In the play Gem of the Ocean, Wilson illustrates people with authority abusing their power. Wilson showing this in the play has relevance to the real world by demonstrating the racial stereotyping on African Americans. Every other day in todays’ it is as if we see another African American child or child getting verbally or physically abused by police officers. It emphasizes the issues and heartache of police hurting their love ones or even worst, taking
For little to no reason police take a person life with no remorse. Which is exactly what Caesar does. In the play Caesar is known for killing a young boy for stealing. The boy showed no threats. It was just a hungry and frighten young man wanting to eat. The boy was caught stealing and as a scared child the first thing he thought to do was run. Caesar clearly saw his face, and could have handled it any way besides killing but his first thought in reaction to the boy running was to kill him. He states on page 36, “I gave him an oppourtunity to stop.I told him he was under arrest. He started running! With the loaf of bread under his arm! I had to shoot him. You can’t do nothing like that and get away with it.” Caesar saw no other way to handle the situation. His only thought was shoot