Sonny's Blues
How does Baldwin's real-life experience connect to his short story, "Sonny's Blues"?
The writer was a poor boy growing up. He was also a Negro, so things were bad for him and his family in white America. He probably felt sad every day of his childhood so he turned to books for entertainment and maybe escape. When he started reading, he found that he liked it and wanted to create stories for other people to enjoy, but he was a poor Negro boy who could not expect help from the whites, so he taught himself to write. That is similar to Sonny, who taught himself to play the piano.
In the final scene, Sonny performs some improvisational jazz. What is improvisational music? What do we learn about Sonny through his performance? Explain.
Improvisational music is when the band members just start playing tunes that come out of their heads. These are tunes they have never played or seen before. There is no music for them to read or write down; they just play from their heart. When Sonny starts, it seems like he is unconfident. He does not believe in himself very much until he gets into his rhythm and then he really gets down. It’s like he finally sees that people are going to accept him and not make fun of him.
Professor Henderson observes that Baldwin adds depth and meaning to "Sonny's Blues" through the effective use of symbolism. Identify words or passages that demonstrate Baldwin's use of symbolism, such as of light and darkness, past and present, etc.
When the big brother says that he felt a big block of ice in his stomach that would not go away, it was Baldwin’s way of describing how the character had a very bad feeling about what happened to Sonny.
Then the author writes that boys grow up fast but they can’t get their full potential because they bumped their heads on the roof of their possibilities. Baldwin means that Negroes could not ever hope to achieve what the white people did in life, that there was a ceiling (limit) for them that was
The writer was a poor boy growing up. He was also a Negro, so things were bad for him and his family in white America. He probably felt sad every day of his childhood so he turned to books for entertainment and maybe escape. When he started reading, he found that he liked it and wanted to create stories for other people to enjoy, but he was a poor Negro boy who could not expect help from the whites, so he taught himself to write. That is similar to Sonny, who taught himself to play the piano.
In the final scene, Sonny performs some improvisational jazz. What is improvisational music? What do we learn about Sonny through his performance? Explain.
Improvisational music is when the band members just start playing tunes that come out of their heads. These are tunes they have never played or seen before. There is no music for them to read or write down; they just play from their heart. When Sonny starts, it seems like he is unconfident. He does not believe in himself very much until he gets into his rhythm and then he really gets down. It’s like he finally sees that people are going to accept him and not make fun of him.
Professor Henderson observes that Baldwin adds depth and meaning to "Sonny's Blues" through the effective use of symbolism. Identify words or passages that demonstrate Baldwin's use of symbolism, such as of light and darkness, past and present, etc.
When the big brother says that he felt a big block of ice in his stomach that would not go away, it was Baldwin’s way of describing how the character had a very bad feeling about what happened to Sonny.
Then the author writes that boys grow up fast but they can’t get their full potential because they bumped their heads on the roof of their possibilities. Baldwin means that Negroes could not ever hope to achieve what the white people did in life, that there was a ceiling (limit) for them that was