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The short story “Sonny's Blues” written by James Baldwin, is a powerful example of struggle and sufferings in life when one wants to go against society's acceptable choices. Sonny wants to be a decent musician in an era when it wasn't considered as a respectful profession and wasn't suitable to make a reasonable earning. So he faced a lot of problems in his life before getting recognition as a musician. James Baldwin effectively utilises setting, symbolism and characterisation to convey a man's struggle to achieve his goal against society's norms. Sonny is mainly conditioned by his physical and social environment. To prove this Sonny's life can be divided in four stages before parent's death, living with brother's in-laws family, joining navy and going jail for using and selling drugs, becoming a successful musician.
Sonny spends his early life, when his parents were alive, in Harlem. They
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At this point, Sonny talked to his brother about his passion in music but he discouraged him. According to his brother, “ I simply couldn't see why on earth he'd want to spend his time hanging around nightclubs, clowning around on bandstands, while people pushed each other around a dance floor. It seemed- beneath him”. Sonny tried to convince him this is the only thing he can do and he can make a living at music but he asked him to continue his education. Staying with brother's in-laws was a bitter experience for him due to their doctrine nature. When his stay ended up, his feelings are expressed in the story as, “they penetrated his cloud,they had reached him. Even if their fingers had been a thousand times more gentle than human's fingers ever are, he could hardly help feeling that they had stripped him naked and were spitting on that nakedness”. Music, which was life or death for him was torture for them and they have endured it just for his brother's
From the first lines of the story the reader gets the impression that Sonny’s brother tries to block out, ignore the truth about his brother and his troubles. The reaction the character has to the newspaper article about Sonny was: “It was not to be believed and I kept telling myself that” (Baldwin 292). At this stage his relations with the younger brother remind of the way a teacher walks across the playground full of potentially troubled kids “though he or she couldn’t wait to get out of that courtyard, to get those boys out of their sight and off their minds” (Baldwin 293). Having some suspicions concerning Sonny’s ...
We are all part of a society where justice and respect must be followed if we want to have a nice image of ourselves and be accepted by others. In the short story, Sonny’s Blues by James Baldwin, two brothers are struggling to accept each other. Until the brother listened to Sonny and accepted what he wanted to do in life and who he was as an individual, the brother was in the darkness with his brother and himself. Through flashbacks and the characters, we were able to see how their life was before their mother and father died and what actually forced Sonny to take drugs. This story showed that without acceptance, people have difficulties to continue their life in happiness, so they stay in the darkness until they accept themselves and the people surrounding them.
Throughout the story, the narrator learns how important it is to Sonny for him to care and listen to him. Sonny is vulnerable and in a state where he is getting into trouble with drugs and alcohol perhaps because he feels as though no one cares enough to help him. The narrator lives his life as a teacher while Sonny spends his days using drugs hoping someday to pursue his dreams of music. Both characters end up in a place they are meant to be; acting as family and leaning on each other for support, which is the true importance of an older brother.
The theme of "Sonny's Blues" by James Baldwin focuses on whether a person should be conventional in making decisions for their life, or if they should follow their heart and do what is right for them. A person begins with strengths, many of which they lose along the way. At some point along their heroic journey a person may regain their strengths and develop new ones. Each phase of this journey will have an effect on them and others around them.
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.
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
James Baldwin, author of Sonny’s Blues, was born in Harlem, NY in 1924. During his career as an essayist, he published many novels and short stories. Growing up as an African American, and being “the grandson of a slave” (82) was difficult. On a day to day basis, it was a constant battle with racial discrimination, drugs, and family relationships. One of Baldwin’s literature pieces was Sonny’s Blues in which he describes a specific event that had a great impact on his relationship with his brother, Sonny. Having to deal with the life-style of poverty, his relationship with his brother becomes affected and rivalry develops. Conclusively, brotherly love is the theme of the story. Despite the narrator’s and his brother’s differences, this theme is revealed throughout the characters’ thoughts, feelings, actions, and dialogue. Therefore, the change in the narrator throughout the text is significant in understanding the theme of the story. It is prevalent to withhold the single most important aspect of the narrator’s life: protecting his brother.
Several passages found throughout "Sonny's Blues" indicate that as a whole, the neighborhood of Harlem is in the turmoil of a battle between good and evil. The narrator describes Sonny's close encounters with the evil manifested in drugs and crime, as well as his assertive attempts at distancing himself from the darker side. The streets and communities of Harlem are described as being a harsh environment which claims the lives of many who have struggled against the constant enticement of emotional escape through drugs, and financial escape through crime. Sonny's parents, just like the others in Harlem, have attempted to distance their children from the dark sides of their community, but inevitably, they are all aware that one day each child will face a decisionb for the first time. Each child will eventually join the ranks of all the other members of society fighting a war against evil at the personal level so cleanly brought to life by James Baldwin. Amongst all the chaos, the reader is introduced to Sonny's special secret weapon against the pressures of life: Jazz. Baldwin presents jazz as being a two-edged sword capable of expressing emotions like no other method, but also a presenting grave danger to each individual who bears it. Throughout the the story, the reader follows Sonny's past and present skirmishes with evil, his triumphs, and his defeats. By using metaphorical factors such as drugs and jazz in a war-symbolizing setting, Baldwin has put the focus of good and evil to work at the heart of "Sonny's Blues."
"Sonny's Blues" is filled with examples of music and how it makes things better. The schoolboy, the barmaid, the mother, the brother, the uncle, the street revivalists, all use music to create a moment when life isn't so ugly, even though the world still waits outside and trouble stretches above. Music and the tale it tells provide hope and joy; instead of being the instrument of Sonny's destruction, introducing him to the world of drugs, music is his way out of some of the ugliness. For Sonny and the other characters in this story, music is a bastion against the despair that pervades stunted lives; it is the light that guides them from the darkness without hope.
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.
The narrator allows Sonny to move into his apartment. By allowing Sonny to live with him he has allowed to trust him again. For example, the narrator explains, “The idea of searching Sonny’s room made me still. I scarcely dared to admit to myself what I’d be searching for. I didn’t know what I’d do if I found it. Or if I didn’t” (pg. 91). This shows how the narrator had the opportunity to search his brother’s room, but had the ability not to. Tension grew among brothers while living under one roof. This starts the climax of both arguing in the apartment. The narrator doesn’t understand why his brother wants to be a musician. This argument was built of emotion both had and not yet discussed among each other. Such as the narrator expressing his anger towards his brother’s drug use and Sonny’s frustration towards the narrator not understanding his plan to become a jazz musician. For example, the narrator states, “I realized, with this mocking look, that there stood between us, forever, beyond the power of time or forgiveness, the fact that I had held silence – so long! – when he had needed human speech to help him” (pg.94). The argument with his brother made him realize that he abandon his younger brother when he needed him the most. He realized that if he would have spoken out and talk about his drug use that he wouldn’t have to go
“Sonny’s Blues” revolves around the narrator as he learns who his drug-hooked, piano-playing baby brother, Sonny, really is. The author, James Baldwin, paints views on racism, misery and art and suffering in this story. His written canvas portrays a dark and continual scene pertaining to each topic. As the story unfolds, similarities in each generation can be observed. The two African American brothers share a life similar to that of their father and his brother. The father’s brother had a thirst for music, and they both travelled the treacherous road of night clubs, drinking and partying before his brother was hit and killed by a car full of white boys. Plagued, the father carried this pain of the loss of his brother and bitterness towards the whites to his grave. “Till the day he died he weren’t sure but that every white man he saw was the man that killed his brother.”(346) Watching the same problems transcend onto the narrator’s baby brother, Sonny, the reader feels his despair when he tries to relate the same scenarios his father had, to his brother. “All that hatred down there”, he said “all that hatred and misery and love. It’s a wonder it doesn’t blow the avenue apart.”(355) He’s trying to relate to his brother that even though some try to cover their misery with doing what others deem as “right,” others just cover it with a different mask. “But nobody just takes it.” Sonny cried, “That’s what I’m telling you! Everybody tries not to. You’re just hung up on the way some people try—it’s not your way!”(355) The narrator had dealt with his own miseries of knowing his father’s plight, his Brother Sonny’s imprisonment and the loss of his own child. Sonny tried to give an understanding of what music was for him throughout thei...
The limits to the narrator’s empathy for Sonny’s concern about his future on pages 496-500 are very hard to overcome considering he has “never played the role of an older brother quite so seriously before.” The narrator doubts Sonny’s decision to play jazz piano or drums so much so that he actually gets angry. “I somehow had the feeling that being a drummer might be all right for other people, but not for my brother Sonny.” He is more uncertain than anything. It’s like when your friend tells you he wants to kidnap a giraffe from the zoo. He wants the best for Sonny, and he can’t even comprehend or imagine Sonny doing anything as outrageous or unstable as being a jazz pianist. “I sensed myself in the presence of something I didn’t really know how to handle,...” To be fair, this is a reasonable mindset to have considering the narrator has a steady paying job and is happy, things people usually want for their kids or siblings. “The chasm” that is the seven years’ difference between them acts as another boundary or limit that the narrator has to overcome. The most obvious aspect of this difference in ages is their tastes in
Letting go of the past is easier said than done. However, accepting the past is necessary to be able to move on from the suffering that it brought you. In “Sonny’s Blues” by James Baldwin, the narrator distances himself from his community in Harlem and his brother, Sonny. Since he is unable to accept his community, he is unable to move on from the death of his child and his harsh childhood, and understand Sonny’s choices. The overall theme of the story is that you must acknowledge and accept your past, in order to be able to free yourself from the suffering of it and come to terms with your identity. Sonny wants to acknowledge the suffering through music, but the narrator does not understand that. The relationship between the narrator and
Characters. Sonny is the story's main character, we read about his love for music, his struggles and inner turmoil, his suffering throughout the story, the hopelessness that he felt during his struggles, as he attempted to escape his troubled life by turning to drugs. Sonny attempted to defy the stereotypes by moving away from Harlem, in search of a career in music. His quest for freedom and escape from Harlem, lands him in confinement. The story clarifies the reason for his imprisonment, and the abandonment he felt from his brother while in Prison. “I am glad Mama and Daddy are dead and can't see what's happened to their son”. (Baldwin, pg. 2008). He admits his failure as he writes to his brother from prison. We are made to believe that he justified his choices due to the challenges of the environment and the racism and poverty that surrounded his growing up. It seems like Sonny and some of his friends try to justify their drug use and addiction, a life style which his brother did not approve and invariably, caused so much pain to his family. He admitted this as we read the following quote by Sonny. “I was all by myself at the bottom of something, stinking and sweating and crying and shaking, and I smelled it, you know? My stink, and I thought I'd die if I couldn't get away from it and yet, all the same, I knew that everything I was doing was just locking me in with it. (Baldwin,