Literary criticism of August Wilson's Fences

Fences

Baseball as Symbolism in August Wilson's Fences: A Metaphor for Teamwork, Family, and Life

August Wilson's play Fences is one of the most well-known and well-respected plays from the playwright's "Pittsburgh Cycle" which recounts the trials of generally working-class African-American families through each decade of the twentieth century. In the 1950s, the decade in which Fences is set, baseball is all the rage as the American pastime, and the major leagues and have only recently become open to players of color, following Jackie Robinson's ascension to the ranks of a professional ball-player on a non-Negro league. This change has come too late for Troy Maxson, however, who now works for a garbage company though he was once a truly great athlete. His bitterness regarding his lost glory days is a major driving force behind his character and ultimately the action of the play, and baseball serves as a concrete and specific example of the limitations Troy has experienced due to his color.

The theme of baseball that runs throughout the play has more than simple and concrete purpose, however. The sport and Troy's enjoyment of it, as well as his bitterness towards it, have heavily symbolic meanings in the play that mirror some of the larger workings of Troy's life and struggles. Baseball is essentially a team sport, but Troy cannot see himself as the member of a team -- he is driven by personal desire, ambition, and a need for control that existed for him in baseball to some degree, but not in life. Ultimately, his failures and missteps in both baseball and life are revealed to be of similar origin and impact.

Incidents of Symbolism

Though baseball figures at least partially in most of the scenes in the play, there are a few key moments that stand out as especially important in defining the role that baseball has within the play. The first scene, which sets the plot and the tone for much of the rest of the play, is one of these moments. It is in this scene that we learn of Troy's former baseball career in the Negro Leagues, and of his son's prospects to play football for a college. Troy is against the idea of Cory playing any type of sport or even going to school instead of learning a good working trade; he remembers the way that baseball and the world treated him because of his color, and he thinks it is foolish for Cory to think that things have changed. Critic Sheri Metzger notes that, "Troy has become blind to the changes of the past ten years," and remains trapped in his own perspective (Metzger pp. XX). Even though there are African-American players in major league sports, Troy holds his memory of baseball as the only way that things are, and he applies the restraints and limitations that exist in his memory on his son and the other members of his family, as well.

This scene and several other confrontations throughout the play, in which baseball language is sometimes used figuratively and at other times the sport is referenced directly, are also indicative of the control Troy attempts to exert over his family and his world. Wilson uses Troy's relationship with baseball and even the physical details of his athleticism in a highly effective way to make this aspect of the character and the play clear as well.

Troy was not known for his excellent fielding or pitching, the positions on a baseball team that require a great deal of teamwork, coordination, and in many ways a sense of humility, but instead was a powerhouse hitter. His famed position was that of the lone man, dependent entirely upon his own strength, speed, and skill, in direct competition with the physical prowess of his opponents and with no assistance from his teammates. His mental confrontation with Death, whom he sees variously as a martial force and as a competitor on the field, demonstrate the perspective that Troy has on life and the world, and they also indicate how he treats his family. He sees himself as the person in charge, and has no real concept of the team that exists around him -- the support he is given by his wife especially, and the true nature of his brother's and his sons' dependence on him. As Cory's final "strike-out" in the next-to-last scene of the play shows, people must behave according to Troy's will in Troy's world, just as he was able to control his own movements on the baseball diamond.

Symbolic Interpretation

The several instances of baseball reminiscing and figurative incorporation detailed above -- the opening scene of exposition and a clarified stance on the subject of sports, the ongoing perspective of singularity exemplified in Troy's face-off with Death, and the lack of teamwork evidenced in both his baseball career and his home life -- all have significant symbolic meanings for Troy's character and for the play as a whole. Some of these have already been touched on above, but more detail is necessary to arrive at a true understanding of this play.