In Fences, the major conflict is not
between white and black, husband and wife, or old and young. Although all of these conflicts
exist, the main conflict is between Troy and his internal and external "fences" (the limitations
which keep him from achieving his dreams, opportunities, financial goals, interpersonal
relationships, and self-image).
As a period piece about a
working-class family in Jim Crow America, Fences pits the individual against
personal (dreams), social (racism), economic (back-of-the-truck status), and institutional
(church, military) limitations. Troy is drawn-and-quartered between all these limitations and,
yet, he keeps getting burdened with more responsibilities within the family (more mouths to feed,
his son's future, his brother's mental care, etc...). It's enough to make a man burst, literally
and emotionally.
By the end of the play, Troy is dead and all of his
family are "fenced off" in institutions: Gabe in the mental institution, Lyons in his music, Rose
in the church, Cory in the military. Only Raynell, his illegitimate child, ironically, is not
fenced off and burdened. She is Troy's legacy and symbolic of the next generation's hopes and
dreams.
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