August Wilson, the Pulitzer Prize winner and confided in his students in a writing class at Dartmouth University that though he grew up in a poor family, Wilson felt that his parents withheld knowledge of even greater hardships they had endured. “My generation of blacks knew very little about the past of our parents. They shielded us from the indignities they suffered” (http://www.dartmouth.edu/~awilson/bio.html). Because of this lack of knowledge imparted by an oppressed generation, Wilson began a quest to illuminate the past of those unspoken African American people through his writing. Through his plays he teaches that the history must be shared and accepted and then valued for the lessons that it teaches before the future can be achieved. In his play The Piano Lesson, Wilson continues this theme through his characters of Berniece and Boy Willie, who represent the struggle for accepting and valuing the past, as represented through struggle over the fate of the piano, and Maretha who represents the future determined by this struggle. Only when Berniece comes to grip with the past and Boy Willie understands its value can Maretha move on to understand both her past and become the future.
Berniece keeps the family piano, with its beautiful carvings and dark past, in her parlor. She keeps it clean and dusted, but will not touch its ivory keys. She sees blood on those keys. The piano represents a sad family history that Berniece can’t cope with and so it sits in plain view, but is not touched by her hands. Berniece cannot deal with her family’s tragic past. She cannot let go of the memory of the father who died retrieving the piano from the slave owning family that possessed it. She cannot see past the sweat of her slave grandfather who carved the faces of her family on its wooden surface or the tears of her mother as she played it, mourning over her lost husband. Berniece only associates pain in the past, which is why she cannot deal with her future. Through her pain, Wilson demonstrates what happens when the past is not shared and understood. It festers and becomes an ugly sore in the lives of those who will not delve its depths for lessons to teach to the future. Berniece is so distraught about her family’s past that she won’t even share the story of the piano with her daughter, Maretha, saying that “I ain’t gonna burden her with that piano” (70). She won’t pass the story on to the future generations. Only when Berniece embraces the past and finally plays the piano to help relieve the home of Sutter’s ghost, is Berniece free. She then is no longer haunted by the past that she so dreaded and is free to pass it on to the future. Through this example, Wilson shows that the past is valuable, something that needs to be faced and understood and then shared. Without that understanding a person will only find misery.
Boy Willie may not be haunted by his family’s past, as Berniece is, but he only finds monetary value in its presence. To Boy Willie, selling the piano is the only way to find himself a future. Selling his past is the only way to secure the future as a farmer, an equal in quality to the white man. As Boy Willie seeks to sell this part of his family’s past Wilson intercedes, showing what happens when the past is sold, as shown through Berniece’s reaction. “Money can’t buy what that piano cost. You can’t sell your soul for money. It won’t go with the buyer. It’ll shrivel and shrink to know that you ain’t taken on to it. But it won’t go with the buyer” (50). Wilson shows that the piano, in any other hands, is just a carved piece of wood, great in artistic value, but without the soul and history that it is infused with. Boy Willie wants to sell this history, in a way denying it the way Berniece has his whole life. He does not feel ashamed or afraid of his past, but he ignores its significance, not truly understanding the value in its teachings and how it passes a story on to the future. In the end Boy Willie understands how powerful the preservation of this past is, as Berniece uses the piano itself to exorcise the ghost of Sutter, the son of slave owners and the cloud of darkness that has hung over their family tree. When Berniece plays the piano, Boy Willie understands that only through this preservation with their memories and past live on, something that cannot be measured in money. Wilson truly shows that understanding the past is valuable and worth more than monetary things, something that should be cherished and understood, especially in the African American past with its constant struggle for self.
The struggle with the past leads to a new future, as represented through Maretha. Maretha does not have an enormous part in this play, but holds one of the most significant roles. Through the battle between Boy Willie and Berniece, Maretha is taught the lessons that Boy Willie and Berniece so easily missed. Maretha is the future of the family and throughout the play she is imparted with the understanding of who she is and where she came from. She is given the love of playing the piano and also understanding its significance. Maretha is also the one who always sees the ghost of Sutter, haunted by the battle of past that is going on in the lives of her family. In the end it is Maretha who wins when the battle with the ghosts of the family that are finally laid to rest. She is given renewed purpose being able to understand where she came from and also given the opportunity to build upon her family’s legacy and move forward, something that her parents and grandparents weren’t able to do. Through Maretha, Wilson shows how valuable it is to pass the past onto future generations, allowing them to understand and add to the story, but also showing that if the past is hidden, then the future can be haunted by it, without the knowledge to exorcise the family demons and build a new future.
August Wilson is truly an advocate for the past and its connection to the future. He saw the lack of understanding of past generations in his own life and set out to show the consequences of denying it to those who should know and understand. Through Berniece, Boy Willie, and Maretha he shows how we shouldn’t be afraid of the past and that it should be valued and passed on to future generations. Only then will you be free. Only then can you truly understand who you are and where you are going.
Works Cited
Biography of August Wilson.” August Wilson @ Dartmouth. 1998. DartmouthUniversity. 27 January 1998. http://www.dartmouth.edu/~awilson/bio.html.
