Summary and Analysis of The American Dream

·         Edward Albee was born in Virginia, adopted, and raised in New York. He was part of a wealthy family, however eventually left home for good. He was expelled from multiple schools. He is gay, and still living. He is 84 and is a professor at the University of Houston.

·         The setting of the play is in the 1950s/1960s and it’s right at the time when consumerism set in. The actual place of the play is in the living room of Mommy and Daddy’s apartment.

·         The plot of the story is that Mommy and Daddy are waiting for a person to come to their apartment, that person turns out to be Mrs. Barker. The three of them, and Grandma, make small talk while they try to remember why Mrs. Barker is there. Eventually a Young Man comes in looking for work. Then the story spills out, that Mommy and Daddy had adopted a baby and had mutilated it and killed it because it wasn’t their idea of perfect, so they had called Mrs. Barker to fix it, because they had adopted the baby from her. Grandma arranges the solution, so that she ends up leaving the house, Mrs. Barker looks like she knows what’s she doing, and the Young Man looking for a job, gets one, as being the perfect son for this family. The Young Man is actually the twin of the young boy that they had adopted and killed earlier, and all that they had done physically to the baby, the Young Man had too, but emotionally. In the end, everyone is happy, Mrs. Barker “fixes” the problem, the Young Man gets a job, Grandma gets to leave, and Mommy and Daddy get the perfect son.

·         The significant characters are Mrs. Barker, Mommy, Daddy, Grandma, and the Young Man. Mrs. Barker is a professional woman and we think that she is a stripper. Mommy is a powerful woman, shown in a not so good light, and she emasculates Daddy. Daddy is passive and shown to be feminine. Grandma is outspoken and represents the old American Dream, when values were important. The Young Man represents the new American Dream, which ends up kicking out the old American Dream.

·         The play is a piece of writing from the “theatre of the absurd.” Albee uses lots of repetition, so often times it’s frustrating to the reader, because something that could be said in one line, takes half of the page to say. This is to show the lack of movement in the story. However, I think this is a characteristic of the literary movement in general, and not Albee himself.

·         The tone of the play is almost monotonous because none of the characters express emotion. Instead, they say their emotion such as Daddy when he says “I’m going to blush and giggle” to show that he’s nervous or embarrassed (19).

·         Since this is a play, the author’s style isn’t so evident, because each character has their own style of speaking. For instance, Grandma has a sharp, sarcastic tone most of the time and says one-line quirks a lot. The Young Man barely says anything, and when he does, he’s so passive, he just agrees with what was said. Daddy is passive as well, so he doesn’t say much. Mommy is a rambler and likes to talk a lot, giving emphasis to details that aren’t really relevant. The only thing in common with the characters’ speeches is that they all pause a lot. I can’t tell if that’s just Albee’s mockery of how people in the real world talk, or just how he decided to write the play.

·         For imagery, it’s not so evident here because since it’s a play, most of the time the characters are talking to one another and they don’t describe the setting or anything out loud.

·         “…I no longer have the capacity to feel anything. I have no emotions, I have been drained; torn asunder… disemboweled. I have, now, only my person… my body…my face. I use what I have…I let people love me…I accept the syntax around me, for, while I know I cannot relate… I know I must be related to” (36). This quote is from the Young Man and in describing himself, he is actually describing some qualities of the new American Dream and consumerism. About how things are about money now and not values and morals as much, how superficial things are.

·         “She’s a dreadful woman, you don’t know her; she has dreadful taste, two dreadful children, a dreadful house, and an absolutely adorable husband who sits in a wheelchair all the time. You don’t know him. You don’t know anybody, do you? She’s just a dreadful woman, but she is chairman of our women’s club, so naturally, I’m terribly fond of her,” (10). This quote demonstrates the new American Dream again, the superficiality. Mommy seems to hate this woman, but then she mentions that the woman has some power, so then she says she loves her, because of her position, not the woman herself. Also, it’s a good example of a writing technique, because the author repeats the word “dreadful” multiple times, but at the end says adorable, which makes the husband stick out more than everything else.

·         I believe the theme is that even though the something may seem like it’s gone, there’s always a way for it to live on, in this case, the old American Dream.

·         Symbolism supports this because at the end of the story, instead of killing Grandma off, who was the old American Dream, she’s still there, which shows that even though there’s the new American Dream, the old one hasn’t entirely left. She’s just hiding for the moment.

·         The tone shows this because one of the only times that emotion is shown in this story is when Grandma leaves and Mommy is very upset and wants to get her back, so it shows that Grandma, the old American Dream will be missed, if only for a minute.

·         The setting works into the theme because the story takes place in the 1950s/1960s so that was the time when people where switching from the idea of values and morals to the idea of consumerism, and the theme shows that just because overall the switch was happening, that doesn’t mean that there wasn’t some trace of the old American Dream left.