Literature Companion: For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf

By History World

“For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf” by Ntozake Shange was first performed in 1974.

It was the playwright’s first work and it was immediately declared most acclaimed theatre piece.

The play includes a series of poetic monologues. These monologues are accompanied by music and dance movements. This form of performance was coined by Shame as the Choreopoem.

The play tells about the stories of seven women who have gone through painful oppression in the sexist and racist society.

Literature Companion: For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf
Copyright
Chapter One: Introduction
Chapter Two: About the Title of the Play and Production
Chapter Three: Plot Overview
Chapter Four: Characters
Chapter Five: Complete Summary
Chapter Six: Critical Analysis

• Language: English
• Publisher: Raja Sharma
• Release date: Feb 12, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310970061

Book preview

Literature Companion: For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf

Copyright

Literature Companion: For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf

History World

Copyright@2015 History World

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Chapter One: Introduction

For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf by Ntozake Shange was first performed in 1974.

It was the playwright’s first work and it was immediately declared most acclaimed theatre piece.

The play includes a series of poetic monologues. These monologues are accompanied by music and dance movements. This form of performance was coined by Shame as the Choreopoem.

The play tells about the stories of seven women who have gone through painful oppression in the sexist and racist society.

Altogether there are twenty separate poems which are choreographed to music that presents interconnected stories of love, struggle and loss, empowerment etc.

The main characters in the play are seven nameless African-American women. They are only identified by their colors.

They are called the lady in red, lady in green, lady in blue, etc. The Choreopoem deals with several themes such as rape, abortion, abandonment, HIV/AIDS, and domestic violence.

In 1974, the writer had written the monologues as separate poems. In the last month of the year, Shange along with four other artists performed the first incarnation of her Choreopoem at a women’s bar outside Berkeley, California.

Shange moved to New York City, but she continued to work on the piece. Eventually, it opened on Broadway in 1976. It was the second play written by a black woman to have made it to Broadway. Before Shange, Lorraine Hansberry had written A Raisin in the Sun in the year 1959.

For Colored Girls… eventually got adapted as a book. It has since been performed Off Broadway and on Broadway.

The play has also been made into a television film, and a theatrical film. The Broadway production of For Colored Girls… was nominated for the Tony Award for the Best Play in the year 1976.

Chapter Two: About the Title of the Play and Production

For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf is said to have been inspired by the events from the playwright’s own life.

It is said that Shange had admitted publicly that she had tried to commit suicide on four different occasions.

During a phone interview with CNN, Shane is said to have explained how she decided the title of her choreopoem.

She said that she was driving the No. 1 Highway in Northern California and she was overcome by the appearance of two parallel rainbows. She said that seeing those two rainbows, she had a feeling of near death or near catastrophe.

She added that then she drove through the rainbow and went away. She said that then she put the event together and formed the title. She admitted that the colors of the rainbow then became the essence of the women in the choreopoem.

"For Colored Girls…’ was first performed