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Light And Darkness In Sonny's Blues Essay

835 Words4 Pages

The negativity of light and darkness in Sonny’s Blues magnifies the suffering in the community of Harlem and reveals the how everyone, child and adult are touched by the suffering. While the narrator was reminiscing about his mother and family when they used to sit in the living room, he noticed the darkness in the night. He saw the darkness fill the silence and hoped that he won’t be touched by darkness one day (19). Baldwin wrote, “Light fills the room, the child is filled with darkness, He knows that every time this happens he’s moved just a little closer to that darkness outside” (19). The light revealed the suffering in Harlem to the child which in turn filled the child with darkness and pain. They can’t escape Harlem because of racism, …show more content…

While Sonny and the narrator were in the apartments after the revival meeting on the corner, they started talking about the music. Sonny mentioned that the voice of the lady singing reminded him of heroin. Sonny said, “ It makes you feel-in control, Sometimes you’ve got to have that feeling” (38). Just like heroin music made Sonny feel in control. Heroin was a more destructive way to control the suffering, but Sonny found he could control suffering with music instead. When Sonny played music he freed others from suffering, but only controlled his own suffering. At the end of the story Sonny invites the narrator to see him play. The bar was Sonny’s “kingdom” (43). The narrator was confused on why everyone was obsessed with Sonny’s music. The narrator realizes that Sonny helped others get free from suffering with his music, which is why everyone wanted to hear him play, and worshiped him (47). At the end of the first set of songs Sonny is sitting on stage drinking from the “Cup of trembling” (48). Basicly, Baldwin biblical allusion is saying that Sonny is drinking from a cup full of suffering and pain, but he is doing it with control, making him not really suffer. Sonny learned how to control the suffering with his music inturn freeing others. Sonny learned to tame his suffering, while giving others peace from their own, through

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He turns to drugs to cope with his problems. All that pain, hurt and emotions he felt in his past life was lived though the music and making him feel he belonged. For example, the narrator to hear Sonny suffering, it took his own suffering, through his daughters passing till he started to gain compassion for his brother while he sat alone and n the darkness in his living room, he thought “…I suddenly thought of Sonny. My trouble had made his real.” That situation lead to opportunity to reconnect with his brother.

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521 Words | 3 Pages

As a matter of fact, the storyteller does not appreciate Sonny's motivations to play jazz music until the evening he socially joins Sonny to his stage show at a nightclub. Sitting in a dark corner at the nightclub, the storyteller listens to his brother play, considering the reminder of Sonny's friend, Creole, of what the Blues are about, "The tale, of the blues, how we live, and how we are delighted, how we suffer... and how we triumph... must be heard... it's the only light we've got in all this darkness." (Baldwin 139). For the narrator, he perceives that the Blues is the manifestation for Sonny's emotions, especially his suffering, because, as Creole would say, music is the only light in the

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The narrator keeps this in mind and tries to sway Sonny to a path he feels is right for him. Sonny wants to go into music however the narrator feels it would be

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James Baldwin, Sonny's Blues Lesson: Read 1. How does Baldwin's real-life experience connect to his short story, "Sonny's Blues"? Read Baldwin's biography for more background on his life. - James Baldwin’s real-life experience connects to his short story by demonstrating that in the story his father had passed away when he was a young age. In real life, he didn’t even know his father.

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Throughout the story he struggles to keep this promise. At the end of the story Sonny invites the narrator to come to a music club and hear him play, he accepts the invite. Upon arrival the narrator realizes he is in Sonny’s world. Hearing Sonny play only one set he is in awe and sends his brother a drink of scotch with milk. Sonny accepts it and gives a nod of approval to his brother across the room.

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As a musician, Sonny takes his misery and that of people around him and changes it into something beautiful. Like characters from the Bible, Sonny chooses salvation, but his fate is uncertain. Perhaps, his suffering is a price paid for being an artist. Moreover, there is something Christlike concerning Sonny's agony, and his suffering is at once redemptive and inevitable (King and Lynn 35-37). In fact, at the end of the text, it remains unclear whether he will continue suffering from playing music or whether a greater redemption and peace await everyone involved.

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838 Words | 4 Pages

Sonny’s Blues by James Baldwin was a short story about the struggles of living in a tough, rundown neighborhood and looking to drugs as a way out. Baldwin’s intent on writing this piece focuses on pain and suffering. The author stresses that not everybody is born in the best circumstances. Sonny was one of those people who grew up in a rickety town where people often did not make it out successful.

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Throughout the story of “Sonny’s Blues”, James Baldwin develops a theme that can still be related with today. The misunderstanding and lack of knowledge that the narrator experiences, about his brother, is something that many today feel, as their own family members are being prosecuted and they do not comprehend why. Within the story, there are numerous subtle ideas that are used to progress the story and theme along to the ending that is given. James Baldwin advances the theme of his story, that misfortune and anguish can be renovated into a unique art form, using characterizations, settings, and symbolisms. One of the main literary devices that is used to express the theme is characterization.

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Many of the characters in “Sonny’s Blues” face battles within themselves. The characters fight the battle of trying to keep the light shining inside and to not let the darkness inhabit them. “Images of light and darkness are used by Baldwin to illustrate his theme of man’s painful quest for an identity” (Murray

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As Donald C. Murray has said in his article, “James Baldwin’s ‘Sonny’s Blues’: Complicated and Simple”, “Images of light and darkness are used by Baldwin… ( Murray 354)”. Also, Baldwin is able to tell a story that can make the reader visualize what is happening to this character Sonny, even though it is being narrated through the eyes and perspective of his older brother. He portrays the older brother as someone who can understand and recognizes the internal struggles of Sonny and be compassionate about them, even though the elder brother does not agree with all the life choices his brother has

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Sonny’s escape in music is him moving away from the pain and suffering in his life and moving towards peace and order. In the beginning, Sonny’s brother was not too keen of the idea of Sonny playing jazz music because he thought he could do something more with his life, but he failed to realized that music was Sonny’s escape from life and all its chaos. However, at the end of the story Sonny asked his brother to join him at the jazz club and watch him play. At first his brother was hesitant to go with him, but gives in and goes to watch his brother. When Sonny started playing, his brother realizes how involved Sonny was with his music.

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Music did have a big significance in this short story. I can understand how you thought there was liberation in this story. For example, there was a part of the story when Sonny and his brother where walking down the street, and there were some people singing, and Sonny said how the women singing reminded him about when he used heroin. Because of the the lady sinning, he related to a time in his life that was not something he would be proud of doing. I like how you mention about the waitress dancing, and how the narrator sees the hard times that the waitress is going throughout, even though she appears to look happy.

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1465 Words | 6 Pages

In James Baldwin’s “Sonny’s Blues” the author uses Sonny’s struggle for a redeemed life to push the narrator toward the realization of his own need for rescue; through this realization, the narrator can find his identity and be free from his sadness. The narrator needs rescue from his guilt of

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388 Words | 2 Pages

Sonny is the main character in the story who has been through a lot in life. He wanted to be a jazz musician. After going through all the trouble, Sonny was a great musician and he loved to play music more than anything. He used music to escape from all the bad things around him. Most black people grow up in the slums and it is extremely hard to make it out of there without getting stuck on something bad.

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In "Sonny 's Blues," James Baldwin shows how pain is not something to be escaped, but something that must be accepted and even embraced in order to achieve redemption, as can be seen through Sonny 's explanations to the narrator throughout the story and by the narrator 's final realizations and abandonment his negative outlook on Sonny at the conclusion of the story. For most of the story, the narrator suppresses his own pain and looks down on Sonny’s way of living because of his lack of understanding. All of the pain he keeps pent up

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