In 1957, American author James Baldwin wrote the story “Sonny’s Blues” which tells the story of the titular character who gets arrested for drugs in the 1950s. The reader is exposed to Sonny’s life as he struggles with addiction and attempts to escape reality through music. As such, music and drugs are two of the most important aspects of Sonny’s life.
Aside from music and drugs, family, nationality, respect, and acceptance are most important to Sonny. Sonny specifically loves his older brother and his mother. His idea of family is forged through the lens of these two relationships, and he holds his older brother accountable for not intervening enough in his struggle with addiction.
Sonny has a newfound respect for his American nationality following his time overseas. His time overseas was not fulfilling, and despite the issues surrounding racism in America, Sonny prefers American culture.
Sonny wants to be respected as an artist. During the scene in the jazz club in Greenwich Village, the narrator finally sees how revered Sonny is among the other artists and how much they respect his musical talent, even when he has not played in about a year.
Sonny wants to be accepted and appreciated in his station in life. It hurts Sonny that his brother’s family feels uneasy with him around, which otherizes Sonny.
In James Baldwin’s story, “music” is a very large category, so it is worthwhile to explore what the different aspects of music mean to him. As an artist, Sonny’s appreciation of music is concerned both with its meanings and its formal structures. A different interpretation, however, connects music to Sonny’s concerns with family and community. These values could also be divided among the different groups whose views he values. In another way, “drugs” themselves are not important to Sonny; rather, he appreciates how (in his view) the drugs facilitate his connection with his music.
One of the things that his brother realizes when he goes to the club is that his brother has strong connections to the other musicians. His membership in a specific group of musicians with whom he plays at a given moment are important. Even more so, his position and reputation among the larger community of jazz and blues musicians matters to him.
Family is also important to Sonny. Being estranged from his brother causes him real pain. It also bothers him to think that his brother’s family discourages his presence in their home.
We might also consider nationality as significant to Sonny. The time he spent in Europe was ultimately unsatisfactory, and he returned to the United States. He understood that he had a home in America, despite issues such as racism, that he was not finding elsewhere in his travels.
Sonny is a complex character who definitely cares about more than just drugs and music. Here are four of his other passions.
It is clear that Sonny cares a lot about his brother (the narrator) a lot, and vice versa. His brother notes that he was there when Sonny was born, and it makes him catch his breath. When Sonny learned to walk the narrator recalls that:
he walked from our mother straight to me. I caught him just before he fell when he took the first steps he ever took in this world.
Sonny looks to his older brother for hope and guidance, and his brother lets him down along the way, unable to always catch him before his other falls in life. In the end, Sonny is finally able to connect with his brother through music and the narrator sits in awe of his brother's talents. The narrator notes: "Freedom lurked around us and I understood, at last, that he could help us to be free if we could listen."
Besides his brother, Sonny also has a strong bond with his other family members. He shared a special bond with his mother before her death, as evidenced by the conversation she attempts to have with the narrator. In this conversation, she notes that Sonny has a personality capable of getting "sucked under" and asks her other son to watch out for him—to let Sonny know that he's there. Sonny sends his heartfelt condolences when little Gracie dies. Even when he is pretty much forced to live with Isabel's family in his brother's physical absence, he longs to be a true part of that family and is devastated when he learns that he is an outsider to them, something simply to endure.
Additionally, Sonny cares about being respected as both an artist and a human. In the fight with Isabel's family, he realizes that he has neither:
He also had to see that his presence, that music, which was life or death to him, had been torture for them and that they had endured it, not at all for his sake, but only for mine. And Sonny couldn't take that.
In the end, it is music which brings the respect that he has so longed for from his brother.
Separate from respect, Sonny wants a place to truly belong and be accepted. Since his parents' death, he has floundered in several attempts to find his place of acceptance. He doesn't find it in school or Greece or even with his brother for most of the story. Eventually, he finds it in the nightclub downtown. The narrator notes:
I was introduced to all of them and they were all very polite to me. Yet, it was clear that, for them, I was only Sonny's brother. Here, I was in Sonny's world. Or, rather: his kingdom. Here, it was not even a question that his veins bore royal blood.
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