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"THE DUTCHMAN."
Term Paper ID:30631
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Essay Subject:
Discusses racial issues in Amiri Baraka's one-act play.... More...
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4 Pages / 900 Words
1 sources, 3 Citations,
MLA Format
$16.00
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Paper Abstract:
Discusses racial issues in Amiri Baraka's one-act play. Examines thesis of play that the characters (black male and white female) are trapped in their roles over which they have no control. Analysis of the two characters and their interactions. Character of Lula as one-dimensional white liberal. Clay as heart of the play.
Paper Introduction:
Amiri Baraka's one-act play The Dutchman examines racial issues, specifically those contained in a relationship between a white woman and a black man. The play above all portrays these two characters as beings trapped in their roles in a play over which they have no control.
Lula is an aggressive and flirtatious Eve-like character whose sole purpose seems to be to simultaneous mock and seduce her black counterpart Clay. Clay's name suggests a malleability, and Lula is more than willing to mold him to her wishes. Unlike Clay, Lula seems one-dimensional, fixated on possessing Clay sexually and psychologically, and then driven to kill him when he dares begin to stand up for himself at last.
Clay is clearly the character most important to the playwright. Clay is at a crossroads in the play, and Lula plays a
Text of the Paper:
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William Harris, ed. She says, "And [we'llpretend] that you are free of your own history. Lula is an aggressive and flirtatious Eve-like character whose solepurpose seems to be to simultaneous mock and seduce her black counterpartClay. He has dreams beyond his middle class limitations, dreams ofcreativity and freedom and vitality, all of which are threatening to Lulajust as they are precisely what draws her to him. If Clay wereas liberated at the beginning of the play as he begins to be before shekills him, he would never have been so timid and confused by her as he wasin the beginning: Wow, you're pretty strong, you know? This is Baraka saying that within the playwhich dictates the actions of both characters, Lula certainly appears to bein charge, to the extent of her feeding Clay lines, shaping him to beprecisely what she wants him to be. Still, just as the characters are to some degree free of their authorinsofar as he lets them have some room for growth and change, so are blacksand whites free to some degree to break free from the terrible stereotypesof fear and hatred in which they hold themselves and one another. Works CitedBaraka, Amiri. ... Amiri Baraka's one-act play The Dutchman examines racial issues,specifically those contained in a relationship between a white woman and ablack man. Underlying this is therepetition of the message that whatever these characters try to make ofthemselves, they remain held back by deceit, by role-playing. The Dutchman. The fact that he dies for his efforts has only to do with his uniquejourney, however, and should not be taken as a statement that all black menwill be or have been devoured by lusting white liberal women. For that is precisely what Clay expresses when he considers his ownbastardized position as a character with one foot in the black world andone foot in the white world. There is a message to blacks as well, of course: Beware oftrying to fit in and stay in the stereotype white liberals set out for you,for when you break out of it, if you can, whites will behave as if you havebetrayed them and will try to destroy you. Clay is clearly the character most important to the playwright. New York: Thunder's Mouth Press, 1991. 76-99.----------------------- 6 Clay's name suggests a malleability, and Lula is more than willing tomold him to her wishes. Baraka seems to be showing that the white liberal woman attracted toa black man is herself helpless to be anything but the destructive creatureshe is, but he also seems to suggest that she brings to Clay just thedisruption and challenge he needs to begin to unleash in himself the strongbeing he was meant to be. Is Baraka saying that this is what willalways happen when a black man dares to express himself honestly andbravely? However, she does not know what she wants him to be, for she is theone who is most utterly driven by forces beyond her control. The play is forwhites like Lula, who express liberal sentiments until they are themselvesconfronted with a black man who refuses to stay within the stereotype theyhave set out for him, partly because they confront him--against their ownwill sometimes--with their own biases and preconceptions and self-deceptions. Baraka's focus on Clay as the heart of the play is seen in hisambivalence. If thereis no room for freedom, for growth, for change, for breaking out of themold of the past, then there is no point to writing a play or reading aplay, much less to life itself. He goes on a jazz/blues-like rant in which heequates killing whites with black artistry, saying essentially that a truework of art by a black man is the equivalent of killing a white person:"Just let me bleed you, you loud whore, and one poem vanished" (97). However, when Clay does begin to express some of this breaking outand breaking free, Lula kills him. The white character is fascinated bythe power and mystery of the black character, and instead of treating theblack character as an individual human being to be gradually known andunderstood, the white character immediately starts trying to limit andcontrol and possess the black character, reflecting the white's attitudetoward the black in slavery. Clayis at a crossroads in the play, and Lula plays a part in forcing him tomake a decision about himself--will he remain the moderate, middle-classblack man, or will he break out of that shell and express himself as anindividual and a true black rebel and bold artist. Lula in that context is not a purely evil seductress, the white womanlusting after the black man only to destroy him in the end when he beginsto express the power to which she imagined she was drawn in the firstplace. (81-84). Of course, the last line is delivered by Clay according to Lula'sspecific direction (84), as if she were the director of the play ratherthan merely an actor herself. Lula says,"And we'll pretend the people cannot see you," meaning perhaps that theblack person is the "invisible man" in society. And I am free of myhistory" (88), meaning that of course they are not free of their ownhistory of slavery. He considers it, driven to do so by Lula'srelentless mockery, and he decides to reject the weakness and compromise hehad previously embraced. Unlike Clay, Lula seems one-dimensional, fixated onpossessing Clay sexually and psychologically, and then driven to kill himwhen he dares begin to stand up for himself at last. No, but he is saying that that is the risk that a black persontakes in a still white-dominated society when he does dare speak out andtake action threatening to the whites' fixed perception of reality. Baraka is certainly making some statement about his own role as apowerful black artist speaking the harsh truth to whites. Lula, Lula, why don't you go to the party with me tonight? The play above all portrays these two characters as beingstrapped in their roles in a play over which they have no control. Hey, you still haven't told me how you know so much about me.... The LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka Reader. Of course, stuck in her stereotype, the white woman drawn to theblack man but simultaneously seeking to destroy him, Lula does indeed stabhim to death, and then turns to another black man who enters the subway tobegin the same dance of death once more. She is the one-dimensional character trapped by forces beyond her control, forces which goback hundreds of years through generations of whites treating blacks asobjects to be shaped and controlled.
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