Walter Lee Younger Changes in a Man
Throughout the course of Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin the Sun, main character Walter Lee Younger experiences a dramatic change in character and motivation. At the opening of the work, Walter Lee is a middle-aged black man trapped by poverty in a white-favoring society seemingly built to keep him down. Years of such oppression have implanted in him a deeply-held belief that his only way out, his only way to be a man, is to become rich. ... However, as circumstances spiral further and further out of control, Walter Lee is forced back into reality and comes to realize the true importance of family, dignity, and pride. However, at the play’s beginning, Walter is completely focused on money. ... When the insurance check is brought up, the true height of his lust for money surfaces, and he seems willing to do nearly anything at all to gain it – if his sister’s college education need be sacrificed or his wife forced to goad his mother into giving up the check, then so be it, as far as Walter Lee is concerned.