Theme and Symbolism in Fences

¶ … fences' is precisely that 'fences' and yet whilst some handicaps seem impassible, there are others that are built on mental schemas, personal experiences, and the way that we instinctively and unconsciously interpret the world. A recent book that I read (unsuccessfully traced) conveyed the author's conclusion from his years of psychotherapeutic practice which was that people construct narratives of their lives in order to make meaning of them. Frequently, these lives narratives may be self- destructive and dangerous to the person's progress. Introducing shifts in these narratives in his practice, the author often found that people were no longer obstructed by their societal or 'self' imposed fences and could move on to form totally different, fare healthier type of life for themselves. Fences, Wilson seems to tell us, are not immutable. They can be broken through and transcended would individuals so wish to do so. Some of the characters in 'fences' indeed did as much.

The characters of 'Fences' constructed numerous limitations for themselves. Some of these, it is true, were socially constructed. Even these, however, may have profited from a twist in the narrative and the characters may have emerged with a difference in their life histories.

Societal and experiential limitations are many: Blacks are not allowed to drive garbage trucks (and inherent in this is the many social limitations constructed against Blacks); Troy never received his longed for change to play in the Major leagues for Blacks were not accepted at the time; Cory cannot play on the team (and thereby forfeits his chance of opportunities) due to the fact that his father forbade the coach to include him; Gabriel has to be committed to an asylum since he is mentally impaired; Troy dies with his life seemingly a mess -- his mistress whom he loved has died in childbirth, his wife, Rose, is estranged from him, his brother is in an asylum, and his son, Cory refuses to attend his funeral.

Even baseball for Tory had become, as Birdwell noted, a disappointment:

The triumphs of the past have become bitter betrayals, and baseball now means lost dreams. Baseball had defined Troy; had given him meaning and status. Now it left him with nothing tangible (62).

Troy has become so locked into the misery of his past that he cannot see the present nor Cory's future and he impedes his son from obtaining success. In Troy's case, the pattern of abuse continues. Abused by his own father, he controls his son and, consequently, loses him.

Troy is not the only one who is limited by confining narratives. Rose is too. Living in the 1950s, she is confined by subservience to her marriage. In the end, fences, both physical and metaphorical, seems to be the recurrent themes of this essay. The metaphorical ones seem to be both internal and external and life at the end seems doleful, miserable, and meaningless.

Can narratives be changed?

At the funeral, Gabe blows his trumpet and no sound comes out. He tries again, but the trumpet won't play. Gabe will not give up. He does not accept 'fences'. He dances. "He makes a cry and the Heavens open wide. He says, "That's the way that goes." And the play ends. May that be a message to the reader never to accept limitations but to rather change one's narratives however impassable they seem to be?

The author's life history seems to tell us as much.

August Wilson (or Frederick August Kittel as he was called) was an inspirational figure. Hardly knowing his father, who was a drifter, Wilson was raised by his mother and stepfather and suspended from school due to an original essay that, being so sophisticated, caused Wilson's principal to accuse him of plagiarism. Wilson dropped out of school and educated himself at the local library reading all he could find. In the 1960s, he reinvented himself as a playwright and was assisted by the Dean of the Yale School of Drama who acknowledged his talents. Wilson won the Pulitzer prize more than once.

Although Wilson's plays focus on the limitations of the Blacks and constraints of life experiences, ironically Wilson did not allow his own personal experiences to derail him. Rather, he recognized his lives' narratives and set about to reform those, creating his own constructive narratives and making them come true.

The story shares this same optimistic message. In the final chapter, eight years after the majority of the scenes in the book have occurred, Bono, Rose, and Cory attend Troy's funeral even though he has caused bitterness to each in turn. Cory, the one who suffered the most from Troy's parenting, refused to attend the funeral. Lyons, another child, barely knew Troy. Rose and Bono witnessed Troy's demise and Rose experienced his infidelity.

Raynell, however, grows up in the more optimistic and liberating world of the 1960s where Blacks have begun to break through the cracks and are offered all the opportunities that they missed. She has never experienced Troy's love, but then she never endured the misery that Cory had. It is when Cory and Raynell sing Troy's father's song about the dog named Blue together, that Cory forgives Troy because he sees the love and lessons that Troy passed onto his children. Moving on from fixation on the narrative of bitterness to creating a narrative of hope and life-transformation, Cory is able to forgive e his father and become a better person than his father because of what he learned as a result of his father's struggles with himself. Some people stay in the narrative so their past and their limitations. Troy saw himself as limited and, accordingly, reacted, instinctively responding to his mental narratives. Cory was, at his father's funeral, able to recognize that the narrative that he possessed of his father was impeding him. He therefore endeavored to alter it in order to be able to move on with his life and refrain from becoming the type of person that his father had been.