ANALYSIS OF THE ELEMENTS IN JAMES BALDWIN’S SHORT STORY SONNY’S BLUES

The story begins when the narrator reads something disturbing while riding the subway to school. The narrator is algebra teacher, exits the subway and continues towards his school, his fear and anxiety growing about the fate of his brother Sonny, who has been arrested for using heroin. Thinking of his brother reminds him of his students, who face limited possibilities in a hostile world. The narrator speculates that many of his students may already be experimenting with drugs like heroin.

At the end of the school day the narrator listens to the laughter of his students for the first time and realizes it is mocking and cruel. As he exits, he is met at the gate of the school by one of Sonny’s old friends, a fellow addict, who has come to tell him about Sonny’s imprisonment. The narrator is repulsed by Sonny’s friend, who always asks him for money; nonetheless, he greets him.

The narrator fails to write or visit his brother in prison until the death of his daughter, when he is finally pushed to pen a letter. Sonny’s response, which highlights just how much he needed to hear from his brother.

Sonny and the narrator continue to exchange letters and, upon Sonny’s release, they meet in New York City, where the narrator lives in Harlem. They enter the narrator’s apartment in a run-down housing project and sit down to dinner. Isabel, the narrator’s wife, mitigates any initial awkwardness by making Sonny feel welcome. However, the narrator scrutinizes Sonny for signs of heroin addiction.

The narrator reminisces about the brothers’ childhood, explaining that his father was a loving, if tough man, with an alcohol problem. He remarks that Sonny and his father never had a good relationship because they were too much alike; they were both very private men. He remembers that as a child the adults would sit in the darkening evening and tell stories of the suffering they had endured.

The narrator recalls that after his father’s funeral his mother spoke to him about Sonny, asking him to be, essentially, his brother’s keeper. The narrator’s mother explains that his father had a brother who was killed one night when drunken white men ran him over with their car. The incident permanently traumatized his father, who viewed the scene from the side of the road.

The narrator forgets this promise until his mother’s death, when he returns home on furlough to see Sonny. Sonny attempts to explain his passion for music, but the narrator is unable to listen, thinking jazz music is beneath his brother. Similarly, he refuses to listen when Sonny explains his desperation to leave Harlem and join the military like the narrator. The narrator insists Sonny live with his then-fiancée Isabel and her family. He reminds Sonny that Isabel owns a piano, trying to cheer him up.

Sonny moves in with Isabel and her parents. Eventually, Isabel’s mother receives a letter from Sonny’s school explaining that he has not been attending classes. When questioned Sonny admits that he has been spending time with musicians in Greenwich Village. After the resulting argument Sonny realizes his music, which is so important to him, has been bothering the family. Soon afterward he packs up his records and disappears, having joined the military.

After the end of the war the narrator and Sonny see each other once again. The narrator visits Sonny in his apartment in Greenwich Village and the brothers’ fight.

The narrator details his daughter’s death of polio: she collapsed one afternoon, suffocating. Isabel, who rushed to her side as she died, is permanently traumatized. The narrator experiences a depth of suffering him never has before. His suffering reminds him of his brother’s trials and allows him to begin to understand what Sonny endured. He finally decides to write him.

Back in the present, it has been two weeks since Sonny has been living with the narrator. The narrator contemplates searching Sonny’s room, presumably for drug paraphernalia, but is stopped by a street revival occurring outside his window. He watches a man and three women testify and sing. Sonny walks up to the apartment, praising the woman’s singing, if not the song. He then invites the narrator to come hear him play music. The narrator, sensing the importance of this moment, accepts the invitation.

Sonny begins to explain that heroin and music help him make his suffering his own, which keeps him from drowning in otherwise overwhelming pain. The narrator objects but forces himself to listen. Sonny continues to talk about the universal nature of suffering and the ways drugs and music have helped him cope. He admits that the reason he wanted to leave Harlem after his mother’s death was to escape his increasingly serious drug addiction. He ends by reminding the narrator that his addiction could come back at any time. The narrator accepts this.

Sonny and the narrator go to the nightclub where Sonny is scheduled to play. Everyone at the club knows and respects Sonny well. Sonny introduces his brother to the musicians he will be playing with. One of them, a fiddle-player named Creole, seems particularly proud of Sonny and happy to see the narrator supporting him. The narrator is seated back in a dark corner and prepares to watch his brother play.

Sonny plays movingly, making the narrator understand, truly understand for the first time, his suffering. Yet Sonny speaks to more than just his own experience. He speaks of the experience of his mother and father, and of their community. The narrator is reminded of his own suffering and of his heritage. By understanding Sonny, he has come to understand himself. After the song the narrator sends Sonny a glass of scotch and milk. Sonny nods toward his brother and sets the drink atop his piano.

1.         SETTING

The story takes place in Harlem in the 1940s and 50s, we can know it from     he'd always been a good boy, he hadn't ever turned hard or evil or disrespectful, the way kids can, so quick, so quick, especially in Harlem (Sonny’s Blues: 1) and when the Narrator talk with Sonny about (Charlie “Bird” Parker (1920-1955), musician for whom Bird land ballroom in New York was named. A founder of he knew jazz that began to flourish in the 1940s), during a time of integration in the United States.

The city plays a pretty important role in the narrative, since part of the reason Sonny turns to drugs is to escape the feeling of being trapped by his surroundings.

2.        PLOT

Plot of Sonny’s Blues is flash back and linier at once. With a fundamental list of ingredients as follows:

a.   Initial Situation: The narrator reads in the newspaper about Sonny's arrest for using and selling heroin.

I read about it in the paper, in the subway, on my way to work. I read it, and I couldn't believe it, and I read it again. Then perhaps I just stared at it, at the newsprint spelling out his name, spelling out the story. I stared at it in the swinging lights of the subway car, and in the faces and bodies of the people, and in my own face, trapped in the darkness which roared outside. (Sonny’s Blues: 1)

b.   Conflict: Sonny and the narrator have their first argument about Sonny wanting to become a jazz musician.

"No," he said, very sober now, and afraid, perhaps, that he'd hurt me, "I don't want to be a classical pianist. That isn't what interests me. I mean"—he paused, looking hard at me, as though his eyes would help me to understand, and then gestured helplessly, as though perhaps his hand would help—"I mean, I'll have a lot of studying to do, and I'll have to study everything, but, I mean, I want to play with—jazz musicians." He stopped. "I want to play jazz," he said. (Sonny’s Blues: 10)

c.    Complication: Sonny moves into the narrator's apartment.

One Saturday afternoon, when Sonny had been living with us, or anyway, been in our house, for nearly two weeks, I found myself wandering aimlessly about the living room, drinking from a can of beer, and trying to work up courage to search Sonny's room. He was out, he was usually out whenever I was home, and Isabel had taken the children to see their grandparents. Suddenly I was standing still in front of the living room window, watching Seventh Avenue. 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. (Sonny’s Blues: 14)

d.   Climax: Sonny and the narrator argue in the apartment.

"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!" The hair on my face began to itch, my face felt wet. "That's not true," I said, "that's not true. I don't give a damn what other people do, I don't even care how they suffer. I just care how you suffer." And he looked at me. "Please believe me," I said, "I don't want to see you—die—trying not to suffer." (Sonny’s Blues: 17)

e.Suspense: The moment just before Sonny starts to play the piano.

 And Sonny hadn't been near a piano for over a year. And he wasn't on much better terms with his life, not the life that stretched before him now. He and the piano stammered, started one way, got scared, stopped; started another way, panicked, marked time, started again; then seemed to have found a direction, panicked again, got stuck. And the face I saw on Sonny I'd never seen before. Everything had been burned out of it, and, at the same time, things usually hidden were being burned in, by the fire and fury of the battle which was occurring in him up there. (Sonny’s Blues: 20)

f.     Denouement: Sonny makes it through the first set and starts playing the second.

Yet, watching Creole's face as they neared the end of the first set, I had the feeling that something had happened, something I hadn't heard. Then they finished, there was scattered applause, and then, without an instant's warning, Creole started into something else, it was almost sardonic, it was Am I Blue? And, as though he commanded, Sonny began to play. Something began to happen. And Creole let out the reins. (Sonny’s Blues: 20)

g.   Conclusion: The narrator sends Sonny a drink.

In the dark, the girl came by and I asked her to take drinks to the bandstand. There was a long pause, while they talked up there in the indigo light and after a while I saw the girl put a Scotch and milk on top of the piano for Sonny. He didn't seem to notice it, but just before they started playing again, he sipped from it and looked toward me, and nodded. Then he put it back on top of the piano. For me, then, as they began to play again, it glowed and shook above my brother's head like the very cup of trembling. (Sonny’s Blues: 21)

3.        CHARACTER

I.    Major Character

Sonny

Sonny is a creative, sensitive, introvert, struggling with self-doubt and a sense of inadequacy that his brother does not see at all. Sonny has never been talkative. So I don't know why I was sure he'd be dying to talk to me when supper was over the first night (Sonny’s Blues: 6).

I told myself that Sonny was wild, but he wasn't crazy. And he'd always been a good boy, he hadn't ever turned hard or evil or disrespectful, the way kids can, so quick, so quick, especially in Harlem. I didn't want to believe that I'd ever see my brother going down, coming to nothing, all that light in his face gone out, in the condition I'd already seen so many others. (Sonny’s Blues: 1)

Sonny’s Brother

Sonny’s Brother is the narrator of the story. Compared to most of the men in his community, the narrator has succeeded: he has a wife, two children, and a good job as a teacher. However, he is constantly aware of Harlem’s darker, more dangerous side.

All they really knew were two darknesses, the darkness of their lives, which was now closing in on them, and the darkness of the movies, which had blinded them to that other darkness, and in which they now, vindictively, dreamed, at once more together than they were at any other time, and more alone. (Sonny’s Blues: 1)

Unlike Sonny, the narrator has a difficult time expressing his ideas and emotions, and only when his young daughter dies does he open up and write to his brother.

And I didn't write Sonny or send him anything for a long time. When I finally did, it was just after my little girl died, and he wrote me back a letter which made me feel like a bastard.(Sonny’s Blues: 4)

The narrator believes that he has been called upon to watch over Sonny, but this knowledge doesn’t lessen the burden he feels. He is constantly torn by his emotions, which shift quickly from love to hate, concern to doubt. As much as he cares for Sonny, he seems to be unable to fully accept that his brother has the capacity for change.

II.Minor character

Isabel

Isabel is a Sonny’s Brother’s wife or Sonny’s sister in-law. She is open and talkative. After Sonny's mother died, he lived with Isabel in her parents' house for a while, while his brother was in the army.

Isabel, who is really much nicer than I am, more open and giving, had gone to a lot of trouble about dinner and was genuinely glad to see him. And she's always been able to tease Sonny in a way that I haven't. It was nice to see her face so vivid again and to hear her laugh and watch her make Sonny laugh. She wasn't, or, anyway, she didn't seem to be, at all uneasy or embarrassed. She chatted as though there were no subject which had to be avoided and she got Sonny past his first, faint stiffness. And thank God she was there, for I was filled with that icy dread again. (Sonny’s Blues: 6)

Creole

Creole is a bass player who leads the band that Sonny plays in at the end of the story. He functions as a kind of father figure for Sonny.

Then, "Hello, boy " said the voice and an enormous black man, much older than Sonny or myself, erupted out of all that atmospheric lighting and put an arm around Sonny's shoulder. "I been sitting right here," he said, "waiting for you." He had a big voice, too, and heads in the darkness turned toward us. Sonny grinned and pulled a little away, and said, "Creole, this is my brother. I told you about him." (Sonny’s Blues: 19)

Sonny’s Mother

The mother in “Sonny’s Blues” is an almost saint like figure who religious, guards and protects her children and husband from the darkness of the world. She accompanies her husband through the overwhelming grief that follows his brother’s death.

"Oh, yes," she said, "your Daddy had a brother." She looked out of the window again. "I know you never saw your Daddy cry. But I did—many a time, through all these years." (Sonny’s Blues:8)

"But I praise my Redeemer," she said at last, "that He called your Daddy home before me. I ain't saying it to throw no flowers at myself, but, I declare, it keeps me from feeling too cast down to know I helped your father get safely through this world. Your father always acted like he was the roughest, strongest man on earth. And everybody took him to be like that. But if he hadn't had me there-to see his tears!" (Sonny’s Blues:9)

"I ain't telling you all this," she said, "to make you scared or bitter or to make you hate nobody. I'm telling you this because you got a brother. And the world ain't changed." (Sonny’s Blues:9)

She has done more than just live a decent life, she helped bear her husband’s tragedy as her own. The narrator’s mother, whose presence makes her husband’s life manageable. Her life story is a direct challenge to the narrator who unlike his mother, initially fails to care for his brother as he should do. "You may not be able to stop nothing from happening. But you got to let him know you's there." (Sonny’s Blues: 9)

Sonny’s Father

The narrator describes his father, a drunken man, who died when Sonny was fifteen. Sonny and his father had the same privacy; however, they did not get along. Sonny was withdrawn and quiet, while their loud-talking father pretended to be big and tough.

He always went on like this, but he wasn't, ever, really as bad as he sounded, not even on weekends, when he got drunk. As a matter of fact, he was always on the lookout for "something a little better," but he died before he found it. He died suddenly, during a drunken weekend in the middle of the war, when Sonny was fifteen. He and Sonny hadn't ever got on too well. And this was partly because Sonny was the apple of his father's eye. It was because he loved Sonny so much and was frightened for him, that he was always fighting with him. It doesn't do any good to fight with Sonny. Sonny just moves back, inside himself, where he can't be reached. But the principal reason that they never hit it off is that they were so much alike. Daddy was big and rough and loud-talking, just the opposite of Sonny, but they both had—that same privacy. (Sonny’s Blues:7)

Sonny’s Uncle

Sonny’s uncle is his father’s little brother who died because hit and run by    white men.

And your father started to run down the hill, he says he don't know why. This car was full of white men. They was all drunk, and when they seen your father's brother they let out a great whoop and holler and they aimed the car straight at him. They was having fun, they just wanted to scare him, the way they do sometimes, you know. But they was drunk. And I guess the boy, being drunk, too, and scared, kind of lost his head. By the time he jumped it was too late. Your father says he heard his brother scream when the car rolled over him, and he heard the wood of that guitar when itgive, and he heard them strings go flying, and he heard them white men shouting, and the car kept on a-going and it ain't stopped till this day. And, time your father got down the hill, his brother weren't nothing but blood and pulp." (Sonny’s Blues:9)

Sonny’s Friend

He was the same age as Sonny, looks like Sonny.

I saw this boy standing in the shadow of a doorway, looking just like Sonny. I almost called his name. Then I saw that it wasn't Sonny, but somebody we used to know, a boy from around our block. He'd been Sonny's friend. He'd never been mine, having been too young for me, and, anyway, I'd never liked him. And now, even though he was a grown-up man, he still hung around that block, still spent hours on the street corners, was always high and raggy. I used to run into him from time to time and he'd often work around to asking me for a quarter or fifty cents. He always had some real good excuse, too, and I always gave it to him. I don't know why. (Sonny’s Blues: 2)

He is the person who introduced Sonny with drugs.

"I never give Sonny nothing," the boy said finally, "but a long time ago I come to school high and Sonny asked me how it felt." He paused, I couldn't bear to watch him, Iwatched the barmaid, and I listened to the music which seemed to be causing the pavement toshake. "I told him it felt great." The music stopped, the barmaid paused and watched the jukebox until the music began again. "It did." (Sonny’s Blues: 3)

4.     POINT OF VIEW/NARRATIVE PERSPECTIVE

Sonny's Blues is a story written in the first-person singular narrative style. The narrator is Sonny’s brother who never mentioned his name. We know about Sonny’s lives, Sonny’s background and Sonny’s problem from his brother. And he isn’t just an observer, but also he has an important role in the lives of the main characters, Sonny.

was trying to remember everything I'd heard about dope addiction and I couldn't help watching Sonny for signs. I wasn't doing it out of malice. I was trying to find out something about my brother. I was dying to hear him tell me he was safe. (Sonny’s Blues: 7)

5.     CONFLICT

Inner Conflict

The Narrator or Sonny’s Brother has inner conflict, how he should treat Sonny, because when he brings Sonny back, he is also worry to bring Sonny back into a bad neighborhood. The moment Sonny and I started into the house I had the feeling that I was simply bringing him back into the danger he had almost died trying to escape (Sonny’s Blues: 6). how he had to keep himself and his family in a bad neighborhood and poverty.

I couldn't believe it: but what I mean by that is that I couldn't find any room for it anywhere inside me. I had kept it outside me for a long time. I hadn't wanted to know. I had had suspicions, but I didn't name them, I kept putting them away. I told myself that Sonny was wild, but he wasn't crazy. And he'd always been a good boy, he hadn't ever turned hard or evil or disrespectful, the way kids can, so quick, so quick, especially in Harlem. I didn't want to believe that I'd ever see my brother going down, coming to nothing, all that light in his face gone out, in the condition I'd already seen so many others. Yet it had happened and here I was, talking about algebra to a lot of boys who every one of them for all I knew, might, be popping off needles every time they went to the head. Maybe it did more for them than algebra could. (Sonny’s Blues: 1)

Outer Conflict

Sonny and the Narrator

Sonny and the narrator have their first argument about Sonny wanting to become a jazz musician. Although chronologically this takes place before the initial situation in the story, we don't read about it until after the fact. This is the primary conflict between Sonny and the narrator (at least at first). Sonny wants to be a jazz piano player, but the narrator thinks this is a waste of his life. Their inability to see eye to eye on this is what causes so much strife between the brothers.

"Well, you may think it's funny now, baby, but it's not going to be so funny when you have to make your living at it, let me tell you that." I was furious because I knew he was laughing at me and I didn't know why.

"No," he said, very sober now, and afraid, perhaps, that he'd hurt me, "I don't want to be a classical pianist. That isn't what interests me. I mean"—he paused, looking hard at me, as though his eyes would help me to understand, and then gestured helplessly, as though perhaps his hand would help—"I mean, I'll have a lot of studying to do, and I'll have to study everything, but, I mean, I want to play with—jazz musicians." He stopped. "I want to play jazz," he said. (Sonny’s Blues: 10)

Sonny and Isabel

When the narrator join the army, Sonny lived with Isabel. At first all running normally, he goes to school and plays the piano but Sonny was not talkative, he just spent the time playing piano and make a record. He rarely speaks to the Isabel and Isabel’s family. It’s wasn't like living with a person at all, it was like living with sound, said Isabel.

But I thought I'd never hear the end of that piano. At first, Isabel would write me, saying how nice it was that Sonny was so serious about his music and how, as soon as he came in from school, or wherever he had been when he was supposed to be at school, he went straight to that piano and stayed there until suppertime. And, after supper, he went back to that piano and stayed there until everybody went to bed. He was at the piano all day Saturday and all day Sunday. Then he bought a record player and started playing records. He'd play one record over and over again, all day long sometimes, and he'd improvise along with it on the piano. Or he'd play one section of the record, one chord, one change, one progression, then he'd do it on the piano. Then back to the record. Then back to the piano. (S0nny’s Blues: 13)

Sonny and Isabel’s mother

When Sonny live with Isabel’s family, Sonny caught by Isabel’s mother that he did not go to school again. Isabel’s mother angry because she feels Sonny doesn’t appreciate the sacrifice of the Isabel’s family who has given Sonny a decent home.

But he hadn't been going to school. One day a letter came from the school board and Isabel's mother got it—there had, apparently, been other letters but Sonny had torn them up. This day, when Sonny came in, Isabel's mother showed him the letter and asked where he'd been spending his time. And she finally got it out of him that he'd been down in Greenwich Village, with musicians and other characters, in a white girls apartment. And this scared her and she started to scream at him and what came up, once she began—though she denies it to this day—was what sacrifices they were making to give Sonny a decent home and how little he appreciated it. (S0nny’s Blues: 13)

Sonny and His Father

When Sonny’s father still alive, they did not have a good relationship, they often fight. It’s happen because his father love Sonny too much, his father afraid Sonny choose the wrong path and end up like his brother who had passed away and especially they have something in common.

He and Sonny hadn't ever got on too well. And this was partly because Sonny was the apple of his father's eye. It was because he loved Sonny so much and was frightened for him, that he was always fighting with him. It doesn't do any good to fight with Sonny. Sonny just moves back, inside himself, where he can't be reached. But the principal reason that they never hit it off is that they were so much alike. Daddy was big and rough and loud-talking, just the opposite of Sonny, but they both had—that same privacy. (Sonny’s Blues: 7)

The Narrator and His Wife (Isabel)

The narrator and Isabel have different social status. Isabel’s family almost did not allow them to marry. After his parents died and he will go to army the narrator had no choice, except entrust Sonny to Isabel. Because Isabel close enough with Sonny and there is no one he has than Isabel.

I knew this wasn't the ideal arrangement because Isabel's folks are inclined to be dicty (dictatorial, overbearing, very conscious of social standing and mores) and they hadn't especially wanted Isabel to marry me. But I didn't know what else to do. "And we have to get you fixed up at Isabel's." (Sonny’s Blues: 11)

They eventually married and have three children, two sons and one daughter. Their daughter Little Grace died in the fall.  She died of polio and she suffered. And it becomes a trauma for Isabel.

And when she did scream, it was the worst sound, Isabel says, that she'd ever heard in all her life, and she still hears it sometimes in her dreams. Isabel will sometimes wake me up with a low, moaning, strangling sound and I have to be quick to awaken her and hold her to me and where Isabel is weeping against me seems a mortal wound. (Sonny’s Blues: 14)

Black and White

The fundamental conflict in this story is the plight of blacks as a minority in America. in the '50s where the story is set, the white men in America still consider blacks is lower than on them. In this story described how white men with having fun hit and run Sonny’s uncle until didn't shape again. “And, time your father got down the hill, his brother weren't nothing but blood and pulp." (Sonny’s Blues: 9) It makes Sonny's father hates all white men “…Till the day he died he weren't sure but that every white man he saw was the man that killed his brother." (Sonny’s Blues: 9)

6.        Theme

Suffering

One of the most important aspects of the short story is how Sonny and his brother endure suffering. This reveals how different they are and the reason Sonny's brother cannot understand him. While Sonny feels more intensely all the hardships in his life, his brother keeps his feelings locked in. Most importantly, the short story focuses on the sufferings of black people in America.

"While I was downstairs before, on my way here, listening to that woman sing, it struck me all of a sudden how much suffering she must have had to go through—to sing like that. It's repulsive to think you have to suffer that much." (Sonny’s Blues: 17)

Artistic expression

In this story the author want to deliver that believed in art as a powerful means to ease or relieve one's suffering. It is only through music, by playing jazz, that Sonny is able to externalize his pain and also help his brother to face his own issues.

Now these are Sonny's blues. He made the little black man on the drums know it, and the bright, brown man on the horn. Creole wasn't trying any longer to get Sonny in the water. He was wishing him Godspeed. Then he stepped back, very slowly, filling the air with the immense suggestion that Sonny speak for himself. (Sonny’s Blues: 21)

Racism and segregation

In this short story although the author only presents one clear example of racism, the entire story reveals a separation made by society between blacks and whites. In spite of being an algebra teacher, Sonny's brother has to continue living in Harlem and cope with the poverty and violence existent in the neighborhood. In this manner we can see that his efforts to have a better lifestyle were not successful.