![]() Solly acts as a role model to him throughout the play, telling him about his experiences helping escapees on the Underground Railroad and talking about how freedom means nothing if other people are still living under oppression. ![]() Feeling “reborn” after his experience with Aunt Ester, he offers to help Solly go to Alabama to help Solly’s sister escape racist violence, thus putting himself in danger because he has come to recognize the importance of community and mutual support. Aunt Ester eventually teaches him that the only way to respond to what happened is by owning up to what he did and then moving on, making the most of his life while also engaging with his community of fellow Black Americans. At his core, then, Citizen is a desperate man who yearns to atone for the mistakes he’s made. Citizen feels unspeakably guilty about letting Garret take the blame, so he seeks out Aunt Ester because he has heard she can cleanse people who aren’t “right” with themselves. ![]() Unsure of what to do, he steals a bucket of nails-a crime that Caesar (the town constable) blames on a man named Garret Brown, who ends up dying to prove his own innocence. He settles in the Hill District but quickly falls prey to the local mill’s exploitative tactics, suddenly finding himself in debt to the mill. ![]() He escapes his home state and travels north in the hopes of finding a better life, but the odds are stacked against him. Citizen Barlow is a young man from Alabama. ![]()
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