Characters are the primary driving power in dramas, novels, and plays. Their roles in these stories help in developing and advancing the plotline. In particular, Fences, a play by August Wilson, displays numerous characteristics of Troy Maxson and how these personalities influence the environment and those around him. Troy is a diligent African-American; he began his career as a garbage collector and eventually as a driver in the sanitation service. Troy endured a difficult life and left his home aged 14. Further, he laments his predicaments on how he experienced hardship under the care of his father. Troy was an outstanding baseball player who could compete in the top-flight leagues had he not spent his early years in jail.
Troy is amusing, controversial, inspirational, and upsetting in equal measure, but he is one person who talks a lot. His conversation is filled with bravery, specks of obscenity, and poetry. He shares stories with unflinching zeal, at times frustrating Bono, Rose, and his other acquaintances. Furthermore, he is seen as a responsible man, providing his wife Rose with his earnings. Moreover, his responsibility is encompassed when he fails to aid his son in following his passion for playing college football to protect him from pain and heartbreak.
He is intolerable to people with diverse opinions towards his philosophies, and hence they frequently dispute with Rose. Troy’s words are charming as he uses them in describing nature as he is resentful of his adventure and the things he lost. His past description is a clear depiction of enslaved African American people’s atrocities; thus, he serves as a storyteller of the past in his family. Moreover, he is a hypocrite; he requires his loved ones to lead realistic and decent lives while allowing himself the opportunity to have an extramarital affair. He also fights against his bosses’ racial policies by challenging the restriction of black employees to lifters rather than drivers on garbage trucks.