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The Short Story “Sonnys Blues” by James Baldwin takes place in Harlem during the early 1950s. The city plays a pretty important role in the short story, since part of the reason Sonny turns to drugs is to escape the feeling of being trapped by his surroundings. Harlem is not a pretty sight. There is crime going on everywhere, poverty in the street, and it seems to be a location where growing up you have to be very strong to not fall into the trap most people do which is the life of drugs and crime. As Sonny and the narrator are driving back to the narrator's apartment (after Sonny gets out of jail), the narrator starts to really think about the streets in this neighborhood where he and Sonny grew up: “We hit 110th Street and started rolling up Lenox Avenue. And …show more content…
This night club is very different from Harlem. This club is an escape from Harlem for Sonny, somewhere he can cancel out all the outside noise. When Sonny is in the club he deals with his problems by making music. Sonny is a very popular figure in the club, and many of the people there look out for him, they want him to play the music he’s good at playing. The club is Sonny’s safe spot, where he can go and just be Sonny, not the drug addict, and not the criminal. Even though the narrator never had nor will ever agree with what Sonny did in terms of drug abuse, towards the end of the story he begins to understand how one could get into that lifestyle. The narrator even begins to think that many of his own students could be doing hard drugs and he even says that "maybe it did more for them than algebra could". The narrator is very aware of his surroundings, and although he grew up in the same environment and was able to achieve to dream middle class lifestyle, he begins to accept that maybe not everyone will, or will be as lucky as he
The transition of being a black man in a time just after slavery was a hard one. A black man had to prove himself at the same time had to come to terms with the fact that he would never amount to much in a white dominated country. Some young black men did actually make it but it was a long and bitter road. Most young men fell into the same trappings as the narrator’s brother. Times were hard and most young boys growing up in Harlem were swept off their feet by the onslaught of change. For American blacks in the middle of the twentieth century, racism is another of the dark forces of destruction and meaninglessness which must be endured. Beauty, joy, triumph, security, suffering, and sorrow are all creations of community, especially of family and family-like groups. They are temporary havens from the world''s trouble, and they are also the meanings of human life.
Conflict is opposition between two forces, and it may be external or internal,” (Barker). There are two styles of external conflict that can be examined within the plot of “Sonny’s Blues”. The first of these is character versus society. This is the outer layer of the external conflict observed between Sonny and the society, which his life is out casted from. The meat and potatoes of the external conflict however, is character versus character. Sonny lives a lifestyle that his brother seems to be incapable of understanding. The internal conflict lies within the narrator. It is his struggle to understand his brother that drives the plot. The climax occurs when Sonny and the narrator argue in the apartment. The argument stems from the narrators complete inability to understand Sonny’s drug usage and life as a musician, and Sonny’s feeling of abandonment and inability to make his brother understand him. This conflict appears to come to a resolve at the resolution as the narrator orders Sonny a drink following hearing Sonny perform for the first time. It appears as though this is the moment when the narrator begins to understand, perhaps for the first time, his brother the
The narrator's disapproval of Sonny's decision to become a musician stems in part from his view of musicians in general. His experiences with musicians have led him to believe that they are unmotivated, drug users, seeking only escape from life. He does not really understand what motivates Sonny to play music until the afternoon before he accompanies Sonny to his performance at a club in Harlem. That afternoon, Sonny explains to him that music is his voice, his way of expressing his suffering and releasing his pent-up feelings.
Under capitalist societies, the only thing one owns - according to Karl Marx - is their ability to work. In a society that revolves around profit and private ownership, a person can only sell their labor. This is the type of society in we see the story, “Sonny’s Blues” by James Baldwin operating in. This type of society is one the main reason for such a big difference between the two brothers in this story. Sonny, the narrator's brother, is a jazz musician. A jazz pianist to be more precise. The narrator comes from a military background, with now stable housing and work situations. Compared to Sonny, a drug meddling musician in Harlem, the narrator, a math teacher and family man, seems to be the more successful out of the two. Just the beginning
In James Baldwin's "Sonny's Blues" the symbolic motif of light and darkness illustrates the painful nature of reality the two characters face as well as the power gained through it. The darkness represents the actuality of life on the streets of the community of Harlem, where there is little escape from the reality of drugs and crime. The persistent nature of the streets lures adolescents to use drugs as a means of escaping the darkness of their lives. The main character, Sonny, a struggling jazz musician, finds himself addicted to heroin as a way of unleashing the creativity and artistic ability that lies within him. While using music as a way of creating a sort of structure in his life, Sonny attempts to step into the light, a life without drugs. The contrasting images of light and darkness, which serve as truth and reality, are used to depict the struggle between Sonny and the narrator in James Baldwin's "Sonny's Blues."
Sonny was brought up in this very Harlem and learned how to steal and fight his way through life. However, life fought him back at every opportunity. “By the time I was nine years old, I had been hit by a bus, thrown into the Harlem River (intentionally), hit by a car, severely beaten by a chain. And I had set the house afire” (Brown 12). Sonny’s childhood was filled with so much mayhem that it would be ridiculous for anyone to expect his turnaround into a functional adult. Nevertheless, he accomplished just that . He did it by learning from not only his mistakes, but from others as well. Seeing how everyone he knew was going to prison, dying, or becoming a junkie, Sonny decided that he wanted a better life than what the streets of Harlem could offer. Sonny grew beyond his environment until he finally stopped doing drugs, he got a job, and went to college. He overcame the low expectations of him and ended up being better than what anyone had expected. Although, his personal growth was not a quick one, it was slow, painful and has relevance throughout the entire
According to Liukkonen, James Baldwin is well known for his "novels on sexual and personal identity, and sharp essays on civil-rights struggle in the United States." "Sonny's Blues" is no exception to this. The story takes place in Harlem, New York in the 1950's and tells of the relationship between two brothers. The older brother, who is the narrator and a participant in the novel, remains unnamed throughout the story. The novel is about the struggles, failures and successes of these two African American brothers growing up in the intercity as a minority. The encounters that the narrator and his brother, Sonny, have throughout the story exemplify Baldwin's theme of personal accountability and ethical criticism.
James Baldwin tells a story about an African American man named Sonny. The setting of the story takes place in the projects of Harlem New York during the nineteen fifties. The story is narrated by Sonny’s brother and in this story the narrator describes the hardships of growing up in the projects. Sonny was the family screw up for he fell into the life of crime and drug uses. Sonny fell into the life of crime for he grew up in Harlem where he “turned hard... the way kids can… in Harlem” (Baldwin 49). Sonny was especially into heroin or referred to as horse in this story. Because of his drug use he was always in and out of jail “He had been picked up, the evening before, in a raid on an apartment downtown, for peddling and using heroin” (49). Harlem and the society had and impact on the African Americans for they never had the same opportunities to succeed before the civil rights act. Even the narrator who was the good and smart kid who had a college education and who was sober could not afford to live outside of the projects. It seems as if nothing would work for every escape lead them back to the projects. Sonny tried every thing to escape poverty, but never could escape it. Sonny said “I don’t want to stay in Harlem no more, I really don’t… I want to join the army or the navy, I don’t care” (60). Sonny was so desperate to escape poverty that
The speeches given by Baldwin match the intensity of the short story, Sonny's Blues. For example, James Baldwin addresses the impressionable inner-city students at Oakland Castlemont High School about what is means to black in America. On June 23rd, 1963 Baldwin informs the young adults about the importance of education, that education opens the world to someone. When a person is more educated about their surrounding they are able to discover all that it has to offer. Many young adults have a difficult time solving problems because their development is still happening. Baldwin teaches the students about dignity, the dignity that is worth expressing is when you have pride in oneself. Some people allow the perception of others to signify their
Sonny’s Blues is first-person narration by the elder brother of the musician struggling with heroin addiction and issues with law. However, on closer inspection it appears that Sonny’s unnamed brother is also very troubled. His difficulties cannot easily be perceived and recognized especially by the character himself. The story gives accounts of the problems Sonny’s brother has with taking responsibility, understanding and respecting his younger brother’s lifestyle.
“Sonny’s Blues” is a well known short story, written by James Baldwin. The main conflict in the story is communication between brothers and finding a way to understand each other. Sonny’s brother, who is the narrator of the story, finds himself comfortable teaching algebra that “suggests his desire for standard procedures and elegant, clear-cut solutions” (Murray 353), while Sonny’s passion is playing jazz. The narrator has a hard time understanding Sonny and believes that Sonny’s interest for music is temporary. He wants Sonny to live with his wife’s family and go to school. However, Sonny finds it hard to go to school every day since music is all he wants to do. When the narrator finds out that Sonny was arrested for using and selling heroin, he cannon believe that it would happen to Sonny, although deep down inside he knew it might. Only by the end does the narrator understand Sonny and feel his pain.
When first reading “Sonny’s Blues” by James Baldwin, it may initially seem that the relationship between musicians and drugs is synonymous. Public opinion suggests that musicians and drugs go hand and hand. The possibility lies that Sonny’s passion for jazz music is the underlying reason for his drug use, or even the world of jazz music itself brought drugs into Sonny’s life. The last statement is what the narrator believes to be true. However, by delving deeper and examining the theme of music in the story, it is nothing but beneficial for Sonny and the other figures involved. Sonny’s drug use and his music are completely free of one another. Sonny views his jazz playing as a ray of light to lead him away from the dim and dismal future that Harlem has to offer.
In "Sonny's Blues" James Baldwin presents an intergenerational portrait of suffering and survival within the sphere of black community and family. The family dynamic in this story strongly impacts how characters respond to their own pain and that of their family members. Examining the central characters, Mama, the older brother, and Sonny, reveals that each assumes or acknowledges another's burden and pain in order to accept his or her own situation within an oppressive society. Through this sharing each character is able to achieve a more profound understanding of his own suffering and attain a sharper, if more precarious, notion of survival.
At first glance, "Sonny's Blues" seems ambiguous about the relationship between music and drugs. After all, the worlds of jazz and drug addiction are historically intertwined; it could be possible that Sonny's passion for jazz is merely an excuse for his lifestyle and addiction, as the narrator believes for a time. Or perhaps the world that Sonny has entered by becoming involved in jazz is the danger- if he had not encountered jazz he wouldn't have encountered drugs either. But the clues given by the portrayals of music and what it does for other figures in the story demonstrate music's beneficial nature; music and drugs are not interdependent for Sonny. By studying the moments of music interwoven throughout the story, it can be determined that the author portrays music as a good thing, the preserver and sustainer of hope and life, and Sonny's only way out of the "deep and funky hole" of his life in Harlem, with its attendant peril of drugs (414).
After reading the short story "Sonny's Blues" by James Baldwin, I find there are two major themes that Baldwin is trying to convey, suffering and irony. The first theme that he brings out and tries to get the reader to understand is the theme of suffering. The second theme that the author illustrates is the theme of irony.