Suffering In Sonny's Blues By James Baldwin

In James Baldwin’s short story, Sonny’s Blues, he describes a story of pain and prejudice. The theme of suffering makes the readers relate to it. The story is told in the realistic point of view of Sonny’s brother. The setting and time of the story also has great significance to the story. From beginning to end, the story is well developed.

In James Baldwin’s short story, “Sonny’s Blues” there is a constant contrast between light and dark. Baldwin uses this theme to highlight the struggles that the Narrator and his younger brother, Sonny, both face. Light represents all of the positive aspects of life. Meanwhile, the darkness represents the constant struggle that threatens the characters in the story. Light and dark has a presence in both characters. The narrator lives his life in the “light”. He is a teacher, middleclass man, a man who has a wife and family. For the narrator, the darkness is his constant reflections on his brother, and his sense of guilt or blame for being the reason why Sonny turned to a life of drugs. The darkness represents Sonny in a way. He is a

Making connections and listening to others can help alleviate one’s suffering. In Sonny’s Blues by James Baldwin, two brothers are trapped in the poverty and racism of Harlem. The Narrator can no longer deny the suffering he has become customary to in Harlem after the metaphoric and literal death of his daughter, Grace, and it is not until he listen’s to Sonny’s music that he can finally redeem himself. On the way back from the prison, the Narrator begins to question his idea that he has escaped the suffering of Harlem. The death of Grace makes the Narrator’s own suffering apparent, and opens the idea of listening to the Narrator. When at the Narrator’s apartment, Sonny and the Narrator discuss

Many tragic events happen in this short story that allows the reader to create an assumption for an underlying theme of racism. John Baldwin has a way of telling the story of Sonny’s drug problem as a tragic reality of the African American experience. The reader has to depict textual evidence to prove how the lifestyle and Harlem has affected almost everything. The narrator describes Harlem as “... some place I didn’t want to go. I certainly didn’t want to know how it felt. It filled everything, the people, the houses, the music, the dark, quicksilver barmaid, with menace; and this menace was their reality” (Baldwin 60). Another key part in this story is when the narrator and Sonny’s mother is telling the story of a deceased uncle. The mother explains how dad’s brother was drunk crossing the road and got hit by a car full of drunk white men. Baldwin specifically puts emphasis on the word “white” to describe the men for a comparison to the culture of dad and his brother.

Ultimately we all find ourselves in that moment when our last breath is released from our body, dieing is our final destination, but what truly determines the worth of our life is the fight and the will power each individual endures in order to continue living. In the story “Sonny’s Blues” written by Jamis Baldwin, Baldwin writes about the suffering we all face in life and how difficult it is to make it through the darkness when one can not see the light. It is the acknowledgement that one did not give up on his or herself that makes life worth living. Sonny and the Narrator's life chronicle emulates the raw uncensored reality of life. Although Sonny made horrible deleterious life decisions, it is important to acknowledge that these decisions

The short story “Sonny’s Blues” by James Baldwin, is the tale of two brothers who grew up in Harlem. One brother is a school teacher, husband, and father, whom was left with the responsibility of looking after his younger brother Sonny. Sonny a troubled young man, struggling with his demons and his desire to be a musician. The brothers, born seven years apart, have a complicated relationship. That make it difficult to understand each other; however, the love and bond between them outweigh their differences. The diverse settings throughout the story positively and negatively influence each of these characters, in a plethora of ways.

Walter Dean Myers (2014), a famous New York Times journalist wrote that “…I read a story by James Baldwin: “Sonny’s Blues.” I didn’t love the story, but I was lifted by it, for it took place in Harlem, and it was a story concerned with black people like those I knew. By humanizing the people who were like me, Baldwin’s story also humanized me. The story gave me a permission that I didn’t know I needed, the permission to write about my own landscape, my own map.” It broods a similar contentment in the reader that the reader’s conscience is questioned by the exposé of the veracity of the characters’ quandary and epiphany and thus, a deep level of appreciative-ness of the American Negro’s struggle is

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,

There can be little doubt that the characters who are the most similar in James Baldwin's short story "Sonny's Blues", and in Kurt Vonnegut Jr.'s short story "Harrison Bergeron", are the title characters of each respective work. They both embody conceptions of youth within each story Sonny as the younger brother of the nameless narrator in Baldwin's tale, and Bergeron as the son of the George and Hazel Bergeron. In their own way, each is antisocial and engage in practices that are disapproved of by their societies. Sonny is struggling with a heroin addiction/habit, while Harrison has plans to overthrow the government. It is worth mentioning that Baldwin's tale is highly realistic and based upon the realities of the time period in which it was written (in the mid-20th century), while Vonnegut Jr.'s story is a satire that takes place in the late 21st century. However, the principle similarity between both characters is their power to invoke a startling change within their lives through their musical prowess. Both characters utilize music to display the best and the worst of their characteristics.

Within the short story, Sonny’s Blues written by James Baldwin there are tremendous themes shown throughout the entire story including but not limited to; identity of self and nature, race relations and human suffering. While trying to figure out their own abilities adolescents who are African Americans had set limits according to the racist society.

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

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.

In James Baldwin 's short story "Sonny 's Blues" a young man questions his brotherly obligations after finding that his younger brother has been arrested for using drugs. In the attempt to rectify his younger brother 's behavior and life, the young man faces his own feelings for his brother and comes to terms with the life his brother Sonny lives. The developments of certain elements-plot, character, point of view, setting, symbolism-in the story help accentuate the narrator 's struggles and theme(s) of the story.

Sonny's Blues is a short story written by James Baldwin. In this story, Baldwin helps us understand the different ways people experience pain and suffering. It is a story about two brothers and the way they cope with pain and suffering in dissimilar ways. As the story begins, Sonny was arrested for using heroine while his brother was a teacher at school. In the end, we see Sonny playing some blues in a club while his brother listens and this is when we learn that, the music helps the brothers to deal with their pain and suffering.

Sonny’s Blues is one of the most revered of James Baldwin’s stories; wildly debated for its variance of topics the short story embodies. Racial discrimination, expression of music (Jazz), Harlem’s quandary and Light and Dark imagery are some of the various topics he conveys in this story. Light and Dark motifs contrast with truth and false truth throughout the story, James Baldwin uses this to denote the narrator’s feelings about many situations he faced in life, light also undertones a moral and law-abiding living. It epitomizes a way to survive and a means to save Sonny’s positivity and possible future to anticipate.