Raisin in the Sun - Lorraine Hansberry [16]
MAMA You must not dislike people ’cause they well off, honey.
BENEATHA Why not? It makes just as much sense as disliking people ’cause they are poor, and lots of people do that.
RUTH (A wisdom-of-the-ages manner. To MAMA) Well, she’ll get over some of this—
BENEATHA Get over it? What are you talking about, Ruth? Listen, I’m going to be a doctor. I’m not worried about who I’m going to marry yet—if I ever get married.
MAMA and RUTH If!
MAMA Now, Bennie—
BENEATHA Oh, I probably will … but first I’m going to be a doctor, and George, for one, still thinks that’s pretty funny. I couldn’t be bothered with that. I am going to be a doctor and everybody around here better understand that!
MAMA (Kindly) ’Course you going to be a doctor, honey, God willing.
BENEATHA (Drily) God hasn’t got a thing to do with it.
MAMA Beneatha—that just wasn’t necessary.
BENEATHA Well—neither is God. I get sick of hearing about God.
MAMA Beneatha!
BENEATHA I mean it! I’m just tired of hearing about God all the time. What has He got to do with anything? Does he pay tuition?
MAMA You ’bout to get your fresh little jaw slapped!
RUTH That’s just what she needs, all right!
BENEATHA Why? Why can’t I say what I want to around here, like everybody else?
MAMA It don’t sound nice for a young girl to say things like that—you wasn’t brought up that way. Me and your father went to trouble to get you and Brother to church every Sunday.
BENEATHA Mama, you don’t understand. It’s all a matter of ideas, and God is just one idea I don’t accept. It’s not important. I am not going out and be immoral or commit crimes because I don’t believe in God. I don’t even think about it. It’s just that I get tired of Him getting credit for all the things the human race achieves through its own stubborn effort. There simply is no blasted God—there is only man and it is he who makes miracles!
(MAMA absorbs this speech, studies her daughter and rises slowly and crosses to BENEATHA and slaps her powerfully across the face. After, there is only silence and the daughter drops her eyes from her mother’s face, and MAMA is very tall before her)
MAMA Now—you say after me, in my mother’s house there is still God. (There is a long pause and BENEATHA stares at the floor wordlessly. MAMA repeats the phrase with precision and cool emotion) In my mother’s house there is still God.
BENEATHA In my mother’s house there is still God.
(A long pause)
MAMA (Walking away from BENEATHA, too disturbed for triumphant posture. Stopping and turning back to her daughter) There are some ideas we ain’t going to have in this house. Not long as I am at the head of this family.
BENEATHA Yes, ma’am.
(MAMA walks out of the room)
RUTH (Almost gently, with profound understanding) You think you a woman, Bennie—but you still a little girl. What you did was childish—so you got treated like a child.
BENEATHA I see. (Quietly) I also see that everybody thinks it’s all right for Mama to be a tyrant. But all the tyranny in the world will never put a God in the heavens!
(She picks up her books and goes out. Pause)
RUTH (Goes to MAMA’s door) She said she was sorry.
MAMA (Coming out, going to her plant) They frightens me, Ruth. My children.
RUTH You got good children, Lena. They just a little off sometimes—but they’re good.
MAMA No—there’s something come down between me and them that don’t let us understand each other and I don’t know what it is. One done almost lost his mind thinking ’bout money all the time and the other done commence to talk about things I can’t seem to understand in no form or fashion. What is it that’s changing, Ruth.
RUTH (Soothingly, older than her years) Now … you taking it all too seriously. You just got strong-willed children and it takes a strong woman like you to keep ’em in hand.
MAMA (Looking at her plant and sprinkling a little water on it) They spirited all right, my children. Got to admit they got spirit—Bennie and Walter. Like this little old plant that ain’t never had enough sunshine or nothing—and look at