In the tradition of tragic heroes such as Oedipus Rex, Willie Loman, and Marcus Brutus, Troy Maxson from August Wilson ‘s Fences is a baronial adult male with a tragic defect that leads him down a way stoping in ruin. Troy ‘s tragic flaw is his obstinate, self-centeredness. He lives in his ain small universe and views the people in his life as go arounding around him. When he ruins Cory ‘s opportunity of deriving a football scholarship, he did it because he believed Whites would n’t allow his boy drama, but the universe had changed and Troy pig-headedly refused to believe it. It has to be noted that Troy Maxson is n’t a bad adult male. His actions and address may come off as cruel and indurate but he besides has admirable and sympathetic qualities. He is steadfastly responsible in his responsibility towards his household as a supplier. He is amusing and passionate and listening to him state narratives is hypnotising. And deep beneath his tough outside is a adult male who truly attentions about his household but ne’er learnt the right manner to demo it. The calamity is that his household merely learns about this after until his decease and after the negative actions he did that rupture his household apart.
Out of all the characters Troy interacts with in the drama and affects, Troy ‘s relationship with his boy Cory is the best illustration of how his delusional worldview causes wretchedness for the 1s he loves. Cory is enthusiastic over being chosen for a football scholarship. Like his pa, Cory loves to play athleticss, and this scholarship is his opportunity to travel to college. Troy, nevertheless, is hell-bent against Cory playing football. One of the biggest causes of letdown in Troy ‘s life is the fact that he could n’t play professional baseball. Though he was a gifted baseball participant in the Negro conferences, he could n’t go up to the major conferences because of racial favoritism. Troy refuses to allow his boy suffer the same dissatisfactory result, so he refuses to subscribe his permission paper and prevents the college recruiter from sing.
All the people around Troy attempt to do him recognize that the times are altering, and that Cory has more a opportunity than he of achieving his dream. Troy ‘s married woman Rose tries to inform him, “ They got tonss of coloured male childs playing ball now. Baseball and football. ” Even his friend Bono says, “ Timess have changed, Troy, you merely come along excessively early. ” Cory names some current black baseball participants to his male parent, like Hank Aaron. Troy ignores this and says to his boy, “ The white adult male ai n’t gon na allow you acquire nowhere with that football noway. ” Cory blames his male parent of making this out of bitterness, stating, “ You merely scared I ‘m gon na be better than you, that ‘s all. ” But Troy says to Rise, “ I got sense plenty non to allow my male child acquire hurt playing no athleticss. ” It seems that Troy puts an terminal to Cory ‘s football dream out of both his ain letdown and his desire to protect his male child. It ‘s these wrestle of films inside Troy that make him a composite and tragic character.
That complexness of Troy besides manifests from the good and admirable qualities of his personality. Throughout the drama it ‘s easy to experience anger, commiseration, and respect towards him. Even though Troy pursues the incorrect class in seeking to assist Cory, it ‘s still evident that he cares for his boy in his fractured manner. Troy ‘s bad relationship with his boy can be traced back to his ain relationship with his male parent. Troy despised his male parent, who was average and did n’t demo any love to him, but kept by his household due to a sense of duty, which is molded into Troy ‘s character. He goes to work everyday to supply for his household even though, but he ca n’t show the love to them that they crave. Without his good qualities to compensate against his bad 1s, Troy would merely be an evil adversaries deliberately destroying his households lives. But because Troy is made as a tragic hero we can larn more about the experience of populating life as a black adult male, faced with lost chances due to favoritism and we can larn a lesson from his failure alternatively of pigment him as a monster.
Troy ‘s tragic flaw prevents him from admiting that times have changed. Like Oedipus Rex who came before him, he refuses to see the composing on the wall. Alternatively of believing what everyone around him is stating, he chooses to follow his ain class of action, based on his psychotic beliefs. Alternatively of leting his boy to prosecute football and college, he destroys his dreams. Because of his actions, he builds non merely a fencing but an impenetrable wall around himself, ne’er opening up to his household. Merely at his funeral make his household attain cognition of his deeper motivations and obstructions despite his harmful actions. As Lyons says, “ You got to take the crookeds with heterosexuals. That ‘s what Papa used to state. ” This tragic instance of tragic flaw at the same time destroys his opportunity of a happy life with his household and opens up a topographic point for Troy in the long line of tragic heroes.
