Literary Analysis Of Sonny's Blues

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Sonny’s Blues (James Baldwin) Analysis Skyler Jackson Eng. 202 Dr. Hadley Mozer 2/10/17 The short story that I chose to write a literary analysis on is James Baldwin’s Sonny’s Blues. James Baldwin is a famous writer born in Harlem New York City in 1924 and passed in 1987. The reason that I chose to do an analysis on this short story rather than some of the others that we read is mainly because of the real-life struggles and pieces within the story that I can relate to. James Baldwin implemented real life experiences from his life growing up in Harlem and that really helped him in writing this short story. Anytime you can take personal experiences and include them into a story someway, it makes it better because the reader can relate. The …show more content…

So, let’s start from the title of the short story, “Sonny’s Blues”. When you first hear the title, many different things may come to mind. My first thought when I read the title was, “oh, this sounds like it will be a story about someone named Sonny with good bluesy vibes and a happy musical setting. Was it about the blues and music? Yes, but it wasn’t what I expected. In fact, it wasn’t even solely about Sonny nor was there many good vibes. It was a lot of struggle, dark themes, and hardships in Sonny’s Blues. Some of the major themes that I will touch on that were within the story are drugs, suffering, family and living area. These helps shape the …show more content…

He’s technically in Sonny’s world and it amazes him how many people know Sonny and welcomes him back to playing his music. As a reader of the story you hear and feel the narrator’s perspective. When the narrator goes to the nightclub and starts to understand, I start to understand. When you only hear the narrator’s perspective the whole story, that’s all that exist and you only believe him. In the nightclub, Sonny is the focus so things really change. In conclusion, I think that James Baldwin used great strategy composing Sonny’s Blues. It is much deeper than the title itself and sometimes it really challenges you psychologically trying to keep up with everything. You really get a taste of the frustrations of African American life in our time, in Harlem’s atmosphere in the

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