Drama is about bringing reality to life through play and interpretation. August Wilson wrote the play Fences about his life: the heartbreaking reality of racism in his own life and the struggles he faced to overcome it. He had a difficult childhood and career due to prejudice and paternal abandonment, and he reflected this through his African American dramatic works. Wilson uses the character of Troy, his family, and his friends in Fences to open up about his life, his struggles, and the horrible difficulties that African Americans have faced throughout the generations. August Wilson was born in a ghetto in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, to his white father, August Kittel, and his African-American mother, Daisy Wilson Kittel. His father left him, his mother, and Wilson's five siblings when Wilson was a young child. Her mother worked as a housekeeper until she remarried. Her stepfather moved them to a predominantly white neighborhood where the family was subject to fierce racial prejudice. Wilson also married several times, having two children, one each from separate marriages (Galens 181). One of Wilson's most notable dramas is Fences, in which he forcefully addresses the civil rights issues he struggled with in his life. The "fences" in the play are a representation of the blockages in the relationships between the characters' family ties and their racial problems. The actual fence in the room was built for the purpose of keeping the family together, while the title word "fences" has a different meaning, that is, to prevent the movement or departure of individuals, families or ethnic groups. Robert Frost spoke about fences in his poem "Mending Wall" showing how fences are designed to keep people in or out and how this separation is in the middle of a paper, without his career having been strongly affected by racism; However, it was this racism and hardship that helped lay the foundation for some of the most important modern dramas of all time. Works Cited Delbanco, Nicholas and Alan Cheuse, eds. Literature: craft and voice. Flight. 1-3. New York: McGraw Hill, 2010. Print.―Fences.‖ Student drama. Ed. David M. Galens. Flight. 3. Detroit: Gale, 1998. 180-197. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Internet. November 23, 2010. Frost, Robert. “The repair wall. » Literature: craft and voice. Flight. 1: 413-14. Kenney, WP “Fences”. Masterplots II: African American Literature, Revised Edition (2009): Literary Reference Center. EBSCO. Internet. December 1, 2010. Wessling, Joseph H. “Wilson's Fences.” Explanator 57.2 (1999): 123. Literary Reference Center.EBSCO. Internet. December 2, 2010. Wilson, August. Fences. Literature: craft and voice. Flight. 3: 422-56.