Sonny's Blues Analysis Essay

“ Sonny Blues” is a short story about the reunion of two alienated brothers who finally overcame the grieve of their struggles through the connection of their emotions. This story emphasize on the capacity at which the intensity of any form of communication can hold, for example: Jazz music, blues music and so on. The major protagonist and the narrator of “Sonny Blues” is Sonny's older brother whose name was unknown through out the story. The story was written in a first person singular narrative way. He had a pretty rough childhood in Harlem. They were an African American family who had a lot of tribulations, their father was an alcohol addict, they struggled through everything. According to the narrator, “he says he never in his life seen anything as dark as that road after the lights of that car had gone away. Weren't nothing, weren't nobody on that road, just your Daddy and his brother and that busted guitar. Oh, yes. Your Daddy never did really get right again. Till the day he died he weren't sure but that every white man he saw was the man that killed his brother” (Baldwin/Sonny's Blues p.132). This statement clearly illustrates how the narrator's uncle was killed by a group of white men in a vehicle. They pretty had a fair share in the struggles African American families in the twenty century went through .

Family values and environmental factors can have a positive or negative effect on the decisions we choose to make in life. In James Baldwin’s short story “Sonny Blues”, he uses this dynamic relationship between two brothers and the struggles they face as individuals and as a family while living in Harlem to highlight multiple themes. A few examples include, coping with adversity with music, dysfunctional family dynamics, and environmental factors. The environmental factors the two brothers face in Harlem are a key aspect James Baldwin expresses in his story. In the author’s story, the narrator finds out through a newspaper that his younger brother Sonny has been arrested for using and selling drugs. The narrator doesn’t realize the struggles Sonny is going through until he talks to one of Sonny’s old friends who is experiencing the same struggles. The narrator didn’t write to his brother while he was in prison until his younger daughter dies. After his daughter passes away he reaches out to his brother and Sonny writes back to reconcile with him while trying to explain his choices he had made. After Sonny gets out of prison, he is taken in by his older brother. In a flashback, the narrator remembers a conversation and the promise he makes to his mother regarding taking care of Sonny after she has passed. The narrator reflects on the constant conflict he has with Sonny regarding Sonny being a jazz musician. While Sonny is living with the narrator,

Fictional writing is generally done just to entertain readers. Some authors create stories with a singular point of view, while others introduce more complex plots and storylines. When it comes to author James Baldwin’s short story Sonny’s Blues, there is much depth given to the storyline and the characters. Sonny’s Blues has been analyzed by many different people throughout time because the story has many elements. From Baldwin’s skillful use of metaphors and similes to his incorporation of religious references, this story is insightfully and complexly written. A simple story about a man and his brother leaves readers with an inside look into family, drug addiction, socioeconomic struggles in the Black community, and the language of Jazz

Children filled with hope, feel that they can engage in any profession they want and are naive to the despair of their lives. One of the first uses of light and darkness imagery is in the following quote, describing how the movies shine hope upon the lives of these children. "All they knew were two darknesses, the darkness of

James Baldwin’s “Sonny’s Blues” and Langston Hughes’s “Theme for English B” relationship between the character’s/speaker seemingly switch roles by the end of the story/poem. Both works of literature take place in Harlem, New York, in the early to mid-1900s; “Sonny’s Blues” was published in 1957 and “Theme for English B” was published in 1951. In the early 1900s, both authors lived in Harlem during a period of “brutal racial oppression of the South in the 1930s and 1940s” (Murray 251). The years after the great depression of the 1930s (Ruby 199) were difficult both politically and economically for African Americans who suffered under segregation; legally in the South (Jim Crow Laws) and in the North (social

Baldwin, James “Sonny’s Blues.” The Norton Introduction to Literature. Ed. Kelly J. May, Bryan Crockett, and Gayla McGlamery.

James Baldwin’s novel Sonny’s Blues puts focus on the relationship between the narrator and Sonny whom are siblings. The narrator feels obligated to watch over Sonny as a result of his mother’s dying wish. The story takes place in Harlem as the center of African American culture at that time, a neighborhood deeply affected by poverty and crime, where there was once a culturally enthusiastic community of artists and musicians. The use of symbols such as light and darkness and Sonny’s experiences with music all contribute to the theme of hope, warmth and despair expressed in the relationship between the siblings and the setting of Harlem.

Throughout the story “Sonny’s Blues”, by James Baldwin, several themes are prevalent. One major theme is suffering. Almost every single character in the story suffers in some way, shape, or form. The story takes place in 1950’s Harlem, a time when African Americans did not have as many rights as they do today. Harlem at this time was a low-class, poverty-stricken section of New York City. Many people were suffering, in the story and in real life. In the story, the theme suffering is shown through the narrator, Sonny, and the father.

The more one becomes dependent on a drug like heroin, the more control one relinquishes to the drug itself. Eventually, Sonny is no longer in control, but rather the heroin and the people who provide it. This becomes a gateway for even more suffering and pain. Luckily for Sonny, he has found an alternative to this downward spiraling phenomena in music. “But the man who creates the music is hearing something else, is dealing with the roar rising from the void and imposing order on it as it hits the air” (Baldwin 137). Through his piano, Sonny is able to grasp the chaos within and impose an empirical order on it by translating it into musical notes. Sonny’s escape into music then becomes the conscious representation of the unconscious death instinct. By imposing order, Sonny is decreasing his amount of suffering, and therefore moving towards peace and rest. The words of Sonny’s brother, upon hearing his jazz, are a testament to the power of music to transport us from the hardships of everyday

Baldwin’s “Sonny’s Blues”, set in Harlem in 1957, was largely about the struggles of an ethnic minority and the stagnation they feel, but moreso how two brothers come to understand each other due to their struggles and from years of living their own, very different lives.

The story of “Sonny Blues”, by James Baldwin, reflects on a time in music when Harlem was at a crossroads in the cultural movements for African Americans. It was a time of poverty and of self-discovery within communities after the war. This story was about the lives and struggles of two brothers within the Harlem community that was stricken by its poverty, crime and drug abuse that plagued its city streets. Their family was haunted with the fear for the safety of their children due to the growing changes of the city, but felt trapped within confinement of its walls of poverty. Yet it was never really mentioned why until the mother explained the brutal racial killing of an uncle that haunted the boy’s father years ago.

As with many of James Baldwin’s literature, “Sonny’s Blues” gives the reader a glimpse of the hardships that plagued the African-American community during the mid-twentieth century. Both the narrator and his brother, Sonny, are victims of the hostility of their hometown, and both try to find a means to escape that bondage. While the narrator turns to another step in the social hierarchy, Sonny pursues his own desires (Reily 58). Sonny follows the drug-ridden pattern of the stereotypical Harlem boy yet keeps his own personal dispositions through his trials.

We are afraid of the dark because we used to die in the dark, we are struggle in the dark or know nothing about the dark. The Dark is unknown, we are afraid because something is going to jump out and kill us, struggle in darkness, can’t see, or can’t hear. Just the silence of true about the world. The only way to hide from it is to stay in the light, then you'll to be safe, said the civilize. Stay in the door at night, because darkness is eating out the light. The lie light has to say to keep to the dark away, keep us sleep at night, so we don’t afraid of dying, during at night. Darkness excites when there is light, during daytime their shadow, but during the night, there is no light. Light and dark excite on earth as civilize and savage the two unlike concept, but civilize had to first be savage to become civilize The

“We grow accustomed to the dark” is about how people grow accustomed to “the unknown” and how most of the time people walk around not knowing what they want or how to achieve it. People do things that they

They act in accordance with us everywhere we go; we cannot escape them unless we are hidden through armor vastly assembled to a bigger being of ourselves, that is when they stop dancing, and lay motionless. The darkness of humans is an extent, complex essence, they carry messages and titles over a person, who brings the brief description of a being or place. They trick people into believing what they visualize in a more excellent manner of a being. Ideals can be displayed as shadows. But a thought of something taking the shape of an ideal does not last long and begins to fade to unveil the truth beneath twilight. Some people who awaken from beneath the shadows live grand and honest lives. While others will live their lives to the fullest,