Lorraine Hansberry: Education and Influences on a Groundbreaking Playwright
Lorraine Hansberry, a name synonymous with the groundbreaking play "A Raisin in the Sun," was more than just a playwright; she was an activist, a thinker, and a product of a rich and complex upbringing. Her education, both formal and informal, coupled with the social and political climate of her time, profoundly shaped her worldview and artistic expression. This article delves into the educational experiences and diverse influences that molded Hansberry into the iconic figure she became.
Early Life and Family Influences
Lorraine Vivian Hansberry was born on May 19, 1930, in Chicago, Illinois, the youngest of four children. Her parents, Carl Augustus Hansberry, a successful real estate broker, and Nannie Louise (Perry) Hansberry, a schoolteacher and ward committeewoman, instilled in her a deep appreciation for education and a commitment to social justice.
Hansberry's parents were college educated. Her father was a successful Chicago real estate entrepreneur. Her parents often hosted some of the most progressive black intellectuals in the country, including W.E.B. Du Bois and Paul Robeson. The Hansberry household was a hub of intellectual and political activity, regularly hosting prominent figures such as W.E.B. Du Bois, Langston Hughes, Paul Robeson, Duke Ellington, and Jesse Owens. These interactions exposed young Lorraine to diverse perspectives on race, politics, and culture, fostering her critical thinking and social awareness.
Adding to the family's intellectual atmosphere was Hansberry's uncle, William Leo Hansberry, a distinguished professor of African history at Howard University. His expertise in African antiquity exposed Lorraine to the rich history and civilizations of the African continent, fostering a sense of pride and connection to her heritage.
The Hansberrys were at the center of Chicago’s black social life and often entertained important political and cultural figures who were visiting the city. The Hansberry’s middle class status did not protect them from the racial segregation and discrimination characteristic of the period, and they were active in opposing it.
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A pivotal moment in Hansberry's childhood was her family's courageous challenge to discriminatory housing practices. In 1938, the Hansberry family moved to a white neighborhood and was violently attacked by neighbors. They refused to move until a court ordered them to do so, and the case made it to the Supreme Court as Hansberry v. Lee, ruling restrictive covenants illegal. This experience with racism and legal battles against segregation deeply impacted Hansberry and later served as inspiration for her seminal Broadway play, A Raisin in the Sun.
Formal Education: From Chicago to Wisconsin
Hansberry graduated from Betsy Ross Elementary in 1944 and from Englewood High School in 1948. Breaking with her family’s tradition of enrolling in Southern Black colleges, Hansberry chose to step into uncharted territory: the large, progressive, and populist University of Wisconsin at Madison, where only a smattering of black students had enrolled since 1875. It was 1948. Some black students lived off campus; housing discrimination was common. Lorraine’s mother wanted her to live in a residence hall. “Langdon Manor was already diverse, including Jewish and Hawaiian students in their number,” Perry writes. The vote was unanimous in her favor.
At the University of Wisconsin, Hansberry initially majored in art, taking classes in stage design and sculpture. While at school, she changed her major from painting to writing. Her artistic sensibilities were heightened by a university production of Sean O’Casey’s Juno and the Paycock. However, her time at Wisconsin was not without its challenges. She continued to encounter racism throughout her two years on campus. She and housemate JoAnn Beier made plans to get an apartment of their own, but Beier’s parents wouldn’t allow it. Beier didn’t have the courage to tell her friend. “JoAnn wrote that afterwards their friendship was never the same,” Adell says.
Despite these challenges, Hansberry's political interests expanded. As a high school student, Hansberry had served as president of the Forum, a student organization that focused on international issues. She also became politically active with the Communist Party USA and integrated a dormitory. Hansberry worked on Henry A. The years at Madison focused her political views as she worked in the Henry Wallace presidential campaign and in the activities of the Young Progressive League, becoming president of the organization in 1949 during her last semester.
Ultimately, Hansberry decided to leave Madison and pursue her career as a writer in New York City, where she attended The New School. “It’s uncertain whether racism is what caused her to leave and not continue pursuing an undergraduate degree,” Adell says.
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New York and the School of Hard Knocks
In 1950, Hansberry decided to leave Madison and pursue her career as a writer in New York City, where she attended The New School for Social Research and then worked for Paul Robeson’s progressive Black newspaper, Freedom, as a writer and associate editor from 1950 to 1953. She also worked part-time as a waitress and cashier, and wrote in her spare time. By 1956, Hansberry quit her jobs and committed her time to writing.
At Freedom, she worked with W. E. B. Du Bois and other Black intellectuals. Hansberry also wrote scripts at Freedom. To celebrate the newspaper's first birthday, she wrote the script for a rally at Rockland Palace, a then-famous Harlem hall, on "the history of the Negro newspaper in America and its fighting role in the struggle for a people's freedom, from 1827 to the birth of FREEDOM." Performers in this pageant included Paul Robeson, his longtime accompanist Lawrence Brown, the multi-discipline artist Asadata Dafora, and numerous others.
Like Robeson and many black civil rights activists, Hansberry understood the struggle against white supremacy to be interlinked with the program of the Communist Party. Hansberry often explained these global struggles in terms of female participants.
Living and working in the midst of the rich and progressive social, political, and cultural elements of Harlem stimulated Hansberry to begin writing short stories, poetry, and plays.
"A Raisin in the Sun": A Culmination of Influences
Hansberry wrote The Crystal Stair, a play about a struggling Black family in Chicago, which was later renamed A Raisin in the Sun, a line from a Langston Hughes poem. The play opened at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre on March 11, 1959, and was a great success, having a run of 530 performances. It was the first play produced on Broadway by an African American woman, and Hansberry was the first Black playwright and at 29, the youngest American to win a New York Critics’ Circle award. The film version of A Raisin in the Sun was completed in 1961, starring Sidney Poitier, and received an award at the Cannes Film Festival.
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"A Raisin in the Sun" is a testament to the power of education, both formal and informal, and the enduring impact of family, community, and social consciousness. Lorraine Hansberry's upbringing, marked by intellectual stimulation, political activism, and personal experiences with racism, shaped her into a groundbreaking playwright who gave voice to the struggles and aspirations of Black Americans.
Later Life and Legacy
In 1963, Hansberry became active in the civil rights movement. Along with other influential people, including Harry Belafonte, Lena Horne and James Baldwin, Hansberry met with then-attorney general Robert Kennedy to test his position on civil rights. In 1964, her second play, The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window, opened on Broadway to unenthusiastic reception.
Hansberry met Robert Nemiroff, a Jewish songwriter, on a picket line, and the two were married in 1953. Hansberry and Nemiroff divorced in 1962, though they continued to work together. In 1964, the same year The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window opened, Hansberry was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She died on January 12, 1965. After her death, Nemiroff adapted a collection of her writing and interviews in To Be Young, Gifted and Black, which opened off-Broadway at the Cherry Lane Theatre and ran for eight months.
A Raisin in the Sun is considered one of the hallmarks of the American stage and has continued to find new audiences throughout the decades, including Emmy-nominated television productions from both 1989 and 2008. The play has earned accolades from Broadway as well, winning Tony Awards in 2004 and 2014, including Best Revival of a Play.
In 1969, Nina Simone first released a song about Hansberry called "To Be Young, Gifted and Black." The title of the song refers to the title of Hansberry's autobiography, which Hansberry first coined when speaking to the winners of a creative writing conference on May 1, 1964: "Though it is a thrilling and marvelous thing to be merely young and gifted in such times, it is doubly so, doubly dynamic - to be young, gifted and black."
Lincoln University's first-year female dormitory is named Lorraine Hansberry Hall. There is a school in the Bronx called Lorraine Hansberry Academy, and an elementary school in St. Founded in 2004 and officially launched in 2006, The Hansberry Project of Seattle, Washington was created as an African-American theatre lab, led by African-American artists and was designed to provide the community with consistent access to the African-American artistic voice. In 2013, Hansberry was inducted into the Legacy Walk, an outdoor public display that celebrates LGBT history and people.
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