Sonny's Blue Analysis

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The short story Sonny’s Blues was written by James Baldwin in 1957. Sonny’s Blue is one of the famous writing of James Baldwin and the story takes place in Harlem, New York. The story is telling the life experience of two brothers: Sonny and Sonny’s elder brother and the story is told in first person narration by Sonny’s elder brother, whose name is never mentioned. The narrator tells the story of how they grew up and the conflict they face and how they overcome in their life. The story has multiple conflicts: heroin addict, unemployment, race-related problems and so many others but the central conflict is that narrators promise to his mother to take care of his brother Sonny.
The story begins as narrator, an algebra teacher reads the newspaper …show more content…
Her last conversation with the narrator become a crucial part of his internal conflict with Sonny. “You got to hold on to your brother, she said, and don’t let him fall, no matter what it looks like happening to him and no matter how evil you get with him.” In this sentence, we can see his mother already warns him it will be hard. The narrator did not really realize his promise until his daughter Grace died of polio. “I was sitting in the living room in the dark, by myself, and I suddenly thought of Sonny. My trouble made his real.” When the narrator feels loneliness for the first time, he started thinking about Sonny and his promise to his mother. People do not realize things unless they have gone through the same situations in their life. “I don’t give a damn what other people do, I don’t even care how they suffer. I just care how you suffer.” This shows narrators love and cares about him other than anything but the narrator is not supportive as he promised to his mother. If the narrator was supportive and encouraging when Sonny shows his affection to become a jazz musician then most probably we will not see Sonny goes through the dark side of his life. Up to this point, the narrator was struggling and conflicting about his decision for not fulfilling his promise to his mother. “I was in Sonny’s world. Or, rather: his kingdom. Here, it was not even a question that his veins bore royal blood.” When the narrator …show more content…
None of these problems are resolved completely but they are on the track to resolving themselves. The relationship between Sonny and his brother had its up and downs but by the end of the story they started understanding and appreciating each other more. Sonny is happy because he is getting full support from his brother and the narrator is feeling pride because he was able to full fill his promise to his
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