The two main characters in this play were Berniece and Boy Willie with the rest of the family as supporting characters. Berniece was very withdrawn and held a lot of pain inside after the death of both her mother and husband. "She is still in mourning for her husband." (1335) Boy Willie, on the other hand, was a loud and stubborn man who had his

"The Piano Lesson" had such writing elements as symbols. For instance, throughout the whole play, the piano played an important and central symbol. The piano symbolized Berniece's and Boy Willie's ancestral family tree with the cravings on the piano legs and other areas of the piano which in-turn represented African-American past (slavery) and at the same time it represented the future in Berniece's daughter, Maretha, who also loved to play on the piano.

The setting of this drama took place in the 1940s in the home of Doaker Charles, Berniece's and Boy Willie's uncle. It was through Doaker Charles' storytelling that revealed the true reason why Berniece did not want to sell the piano. Berniece did not want to sell the piano because her father died over it and her mother used to clean the piano by rubbing it until she bleed. Also, the piano has totems carved on the legs and other areas by a slave ancestor that told the whole family history of Boy Willie and Berniece. More revelations of their family history are told by the rambling, traveling, drinking man nicked named Wining Boy. He tells of a sordid relationship with Lymon's mother and brings news about home, which is Mississippi. The setting of this play further complicated the situation due to the storytelling of Doaker Charles and Wining Boy. Through the storytelling of Doaker Charles and Wining Boy, we find out why it is so important to keep the piano in the family and not sell it. The family piano has a long family history, a history that influenced the present and to sell it would be like selling a part of your past; a part of your heritage; a part of your soul.

mind set on selling the family piano from the onset of the play and nothing or no one was going to change his mind. "He is a brash and impulsive, talkative, and somewhat crude in speech and manner." (1334) These characteristics of the two main characters refer back to the theme of this play by illustrating the attitudes of African-Americans towards the past, present and future. Boy Willie doesn't want the past to

Some topics in this essay:
Boy Willie, According Berniece, Piano Lesson, Boy Willie's, Wining Boy, Doaker Charles', Willie Berniece, Lymon Berniece's, August Wilson, Berniece Crawley's, boy willie, family piano, piano lesson, painful past, berniece sell piano, berniece sell, wining boy, sell family, main characters, sell piano, sell family piano, terms ghosts past, piano family, universal depiction human, african-americans universal depiction,