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Raisin in The Sun Act I Scene One

Ruth comes home forlornly, revealing to Mama and Beneatha that she is two months pregnant. Beneatha questions if it was planned or an accident, upsetting Ruth. Mama tries to comfort Ruth as she breaks down sobbing. Travis arrives and Ruth yells at him. Mama shares the news that she used their money to buy a house, putting the remaining money in Walter's name and trusting him to be the head of the family.

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Pauline Karen Concepcion
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565 views2 pages

Raisin in The Sun Act I Scene One

Ruth comes home forlornly, revealing to Mama and Beneatha that she is two months pregnant. Beneatha questions if it was planned or an accident, upsetting Ruth. Mama tries to comfort Ruth as she breaks down sobbing. Travis arrives and Ruth yells at him. Mama shares the news that she used their money to buy a house, putting the remaining money in Walter's name and trusting him to be the head of the family.

Uploaded by

Pauline Karen Concepcion
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Act I Scene One: Friday Morning Scene Two:

The following morning (RUTH comes in forlornly and pulls off her coat with dejection. Mama and
Beneatha both turn to look at her.)

RUTH (dispiritedly): Well, I guess from all the happy faces—everybody knows.

BENEATHA: You pregnant?

MAMA: Lord have mercy, I sure hope it’s a little old girl. Travis ought to have a sister.

(BENEATHA and RUTH give her a hopeless look for this grandmotherly enthusiasm).

BENEATHA: How far along are you?

RUTH: Two months

BENEATHA: Did you mean to? I mean did you plan it or was it an accident?

MAMA: What do you know about planning or not planning?

BENEATHA: Oh, Mama. RUTH (wearily): She’s twenty years old, Lena.

BENEATHA: Did you plan it, Ruth?

RUTH: Mind your own business.

BENEATHA: It is my business—where is he going to live, on the roof? (There is silence following the
remark as the three women react to the sense of it.) Gee—I didn’t mean that, Ruth, honest. Gee, I don’t
feel like that at all. I—I think it is wonderful.

RUTH (dully): Wonderful. BENEATHA: Yes—really.

MAMA (looking at RUTH, worried): Doctor say everything is going to be all right?

RUTH (far away): Yes—she says everything is going to be fine…

MAMA (immediately suspicious): “She”—What doctor you went to? (RUTH folds over, near hysteria)

MAMA (worriedly hovering over RUTH): Ruth honey—what’s the matter with you—you sick? (RUTH has
her fist clenched on her thighs and is fighting hard to suppress a scream that seems to be rising in her

BENEATHA: What’s the matter with her, Mama?

MAMA (working her fingers in RUTH’s shoulders to relax her): She be all right. Women gets right
depressed sometimes when they get her way. (Speaking softly, expertly, rapidly). Now you just relax.
That’s right…just lean back, don’t think ‘bout nothing at all…nothing at all—

RUTH: I’m all right… (The glassy-eyed look melts and then she collapses into a fit of heavy sobbing. The
bell rings.) (The front door opens slowly, interrupting him, and TRAVIS peeks his head in, less than
hopefully)

TRAVIS (to his mother): Mama, I—

RUTH: “Mama I” nothing! You’re going to get it, boy! Get on in that bedroom, and get yourself ready!
TRAVIS: But I—

MAMA: Why don’t you all never let the child explain hisself

RUTH: Keep out of it now, Lena. (Mama clamps her lips together, and RUTH advances toward her son
menacingly.)

RUTH: A thousand times I have told you not to go off like that— MAMA (holding out her arms to her
grandson): Well—at least let me tell him something. I want him to be the first one to hear… Come here,
Travis. (The boy obeys, gladly.) Travis— (She takes him by the shoulder and looks into his face)—you
know that money we got in the mail this morning?

TRAVIS: Yes ‘m---

MAMA: Well—What you think your grandma gone and done with that money?

TRAVIS: I don’t know, Grandmama. MAMA (putting her fingers on his nose for emphasis): She went out
and bought you a house! (The explosion comes from WALTER at the end of the revelation and he jumps
up and turns away from all of them in a fury. MAMA continues, to TRAVIS) You glad about the house?
It’s going to be yours when you get to be a man.

TRAVIS: Yeah—I always wanted to live in a house.

MAMA (She takes an envelope out of her handbag and puts it in front of him and he watches her
without speaking or moving.) I paid the man thirty-five hundred dollars down on the house. That leaves
sixty-five hundred dollars. Monday morning I want you to take this money and take three thousand
dollars and put it in a savings account for Beneatha’s medical schooling. The rest you put in a checking
account—with your name on it. And from now on, any penny that come out of it or that go in it is for
you to look after. For you to decide. (She drops her hand a little helplessly.) It ain’t much, but it’s all I got
in the world and I’m putting it in your hands. I’m telling you to be the head of this family from now on
like you supposed to be.

WALTER (stares at the money): You trust me like that, Mama?

MAMA: I ain’t never stop trusting you. Like I ain’t never stop loving you. (She goes out, and WALTER sits
looking at the money on the table.

Finally, in a decisive gesture, he gets up, and, in mingled joy and desperation, picks up the money.)

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