Topdog Underdog Summary

Topdog/ underdog
The play is written by Suzan-Lori Parks who became the first African American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize in Drama in addition to many other prizes. The play revolves around relationships of power and control between two brothers; both of them are the protagonist of the plot. Their parents thought it is amusing to name them after Abraham Lincoln and his assassin. The drama was very successful because of the insights it presented into the role of betrayal and deception in society, and other related social issues that have to do with money and violence. The main theme of the play is the power relationships that can divide the closest people and make them lose the basic human attributes. Lincoln and Booth embody this struggle of power that leads to their downfall eventually as booth resorts to violence and kills Lincoln. There is a depiction of the social
The dialogues are filled with tension, laughter and comedy and this makes the play fit into the tragicomedy category. The playwright incorporated a cluster of themes within the plot and shaped her characters according to certain profound psychological and mental states. She stays objective and gives the audience a hint of foreshadowing in order to make the play more interesting and prepare the ground for the upcoming clash. She also keeps a certain mysterious tone in the whole play such as the existence of Grace or her being a construct of Booth’s imagination. The reader might also start to see all the symbols and historical references that give a much exciting unraveling of the events. For instance, the two brothers were named after Abraham Lincoln and his killer; both were abandoned by their parents, and this leads the audience to consider all the psychological damages that took place as a result of these unfortunate