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A review by ojohnson
The Piano Lesson by August Wilson
4.0
This is honestly a great play that kept me enticed throughout. I read it for my English class and most of the time I cannot decipher what is happening in plays or get extremely confused throughout but my confusion was extremely limited.
In the beginning I was very confused on the period and context, having jumped right into reading, but once we set the scene as a class and I reread for my paper everything came together. I saw the characters from the beginning which was so cool.
For class we analyzed Wilson's quote "They both were right and they both were wrong" and it is so interesting to see Boy Willie and Berniece's relationship in that view. The entire book I was trying to pick a side and it made me see that as much as I would like to be like Boy Willie and have ambition to create a new life by selling the piano, I am a Berniece through and through. I am a sentimentalist, who holds onto every stray thing from my childhood or anything that has some semblance of historical prevalence to my family tree. And I am very keen to not explaining my side, which is pretty much how she was presented throughout the novel: not wanting to speak her truth, just tired of everything, feeling like she would not win.
I was not really a fan of the ending. It was very face paced and the "magical" aspect of the song/chant Berniece did was not thoroughly explained. The entire novel Berniece and Boy Willie's tension is extremely strong and then he just leaves?!?! Before they couldn't even see each other's points of view and then they just gave up? Both going back to their respective lives.
In the beginning I was very confused on the period and context, having jumped right into reading, but once we set the scene as a class and I reread for my paper everything came together. I saw the characters from the beginning which was so cool.
For class we analyzed Wilson's quote "They both were right and they both were wrong" and it is so interesting to see Boy Willie and Berniece's relationship in that view. The entire book I was trying to pick a side and it made me see that as much as I would like to be like Boy Willie and have ambition to create a new life by selling the piano, I am a Berniece through and through. I am a sentimentalist, who holds onto every stray thing from my childhood or anything that has some semblance of historical prevalence to my family tree. And I am very keen to not explaining my side, which is pretty much how she was presented throughout the novel: not wanting to speak her truth, just tired of everything, feeling like she would not win.
I was not really a fan of the ending. It was very face paced and the "magical" aspect of the song/chant Berniece did was not thoroughly explained. The entire novel Berniece and Boy Willie's tension is extremely strong and then he just leaves?!?! Before they couldn't even see each other's points of view and then they just gave up? Both going back to their respective lives.