Essay on "No Child"

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Essay 3 on "No Child..." In the play No Child..., readers get a close look into an inner city school. The school is called Malcolm X High School and it is located in the Bronx, U.S.A. In this play there are several characters whose actions and dialogue give readers an in depth look into the social life of inner city children. I believe that what Nilaja Sun was trying to say about people by writing this play is that everyone has the potential to be great, no matter what their personal circumstances may be. The first character readers meet in the play is the janitor named Baron. Baron is an older man in his eighties who has been working at Malcolm X High School for several decades. He gives a little speech about how different the school has become over the years and how the school is now. He talks about the metal detectors, security guards, and drug sniffing dogs that now guard the entrance to the school (Sun 1970). The purpose of the security guard in the play is to act as the narrator and set the scene for the rest of the play. However, when looked at from a Marxist approach I believe the janitor serves as a symbol for the stereotypical working class American. He is the underpaid and overworked old man that seems to have a lot of wisdom and experience. Readers can see this by his line in the opening speech when he says, "See, I been working here since 1958 and I done seen some teachers come and go" (Sun 1970). Through the janitor's dialogue and experiences throughout the play we get a look at the stereotypical working class American. No one ever really seems to notice him throughout the play but he does his job nonetheless. In fact, it is only in his death that the other characters even acknowledge him ( Sun 1983) and I believe this is a statement about how unappreciated the "blue collar" class really is. I believe that Nilaja Sun may be saying that the working

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