Nice Man Naive Man

LULA. Clay? Really? Clay what? CLAY. Take your pick. Jackson, Johnson, or Williams. LULA. Oh, really? Good for you. But it’s got to be Williams. You’re too pretentious to be a Jackson or Johnson. Baraka, p. 4 Owning the self-derision and humor are such remedies to sadness, which was widely used by the African American men in that era, incarnated by Clay. He understands that things and events only have the importance that people grants them. Additionally, the statement that self-derision as an African American man is to keep from being sane. CLAY. .... And I’m the grezt would-be poet. Yes. That’s right Poet. Some kind of bastard literature ... all it needs is a simple knife thrust. Just let me bleed you, ...... A whole people of neurotics, struggling to keep from being sane Baraka, p. 9 As Clay states above, he is aware and concerned about the condition of African Americans in that era. Black movements had spread widely and rapidly across the U. S. It is he who should control himself for being sane, to face the situation between him and Lula. Being sane would mean revenge, but violence never seemed to pay off for the African American man until then – and violence causes violence. Yet he consciously understands that he still has a spirit and identity as an African American man. Clay is seen to be a nice African American gentleman. He answers and responds to Lula’s questions in the most polite way possible. He puts aside any racial issues happening at that time, and keeps being nice until Lula drives him mad by telling him racial statements his ‘kind’. Yet, Clay is a naive young man. Clay shows how naive he is by responding to Lula’s statement during Scene One with innocent replies. He simply thinks that Lula is joking. Therefore, he responds it excitingly and innocently. Educated middle-class man also becomes an aspect in Clay’s depiction. His statement about going to college, and the suit he is wearing during the event, shows his social status as a middle-class African American man. Though he is depicted that way, he can not cover something that is important for this research: identity. Through the play, the writer finds evidences that Clay has identity issues as an African American man. However, above everything he is depicted in the play, indeed, he is still seen as someone with good sense of humor. Apart from that, he is still aware about happening issues during that time, including occurences he is involved in.

B. Clay’s Experiences of Racial Stereotyping

Dutchman is nevertheless only a theatrical play: a representation of reality. The experience of racial stereotyping that appears in the play has to be replaced in reality so that we can judge its relevance or applicability. The publication of such a play in 1964 was not innocent. This year saw the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which banned discrimination based on race, color, religion, or natural origin in employment practices and public accommodations. The situation depicted in the play is indeed a very topical one. The 1964 spectator was also aware of the fragility of such a depiction. Seeing a White American woman sitting next to an African American man in a subway was still an unusual situation that caused tensions. Apart from the drunken man, the other passengers who gradually appear on the setting probably sense the dangerous characters of Lula and Clay’s meeting and prefer to ignore it. Clay himself seems a little taken aback when he realizes that he has an audience.