It is the personal tragedy of losing his own daughter Grace, from polio, that finally causes the narrator to understand the pain that Sonny felt throughout his life. And "on the very day that little Grace was buried," (Baldwin, 139) the narrator decides to reach out to his brother Sonny
Scott Fitzgerald), he never really abandoned his American identity - and yet, he was criticized by liberal white critics - such as Irving Howe - who expected that every successful black author should follow the literary protestation style of Richard Wright, without doubt the dominant black writer in postwar America. "The program which the young Baldwin set for himself - a program of aesthetic autonomy and faithfulness to private experience, as against ideological noise and blunt stereotype - was almost impossible for the Negro Writer to realize" (Howe, 1979)
And so it's clear that James, beyond his awe-inspiring talent for essay and story-telling was, if not universally loved and respected by the African-American community, at the very least a trailblazer within the black artists' community - and as such was a fair target for more militant blacks. Clearly, the tone of James' work was the antithesis of Richard Wright's tone, which had a distinct flavor of misogyny; and even more dramatically, James was "synthesizing race and gay consciousness during some of the most politically volatile decades of the twentieth century" (Shin, 1998)
His way of dealing with his brother was keeping it outside of himself for a long time. (Baldwin 22) The narrator admits that his brother is "wild, but he wasn't crazy
The narrator at first shows a complete lack of understanding for his brother's choice, "All I know about music is that not many people ever really hear it. And even when on the rare occasion when something opens within, and the music enters, what we mainly hear, or hear corroborated, are the personal, private, vanishing evocations," (Baldwin 119)
This then led him to look down upon his brother Sonny for his own personal method of escaping the streets of Harlem. He refused to look at the world in Sonny's shoes using music as the ultimate means of expression, "He expresses a desire to know, and remorse when he does not listen, but he also repeats his unwillingness to understand," (Byerman 368)
And so, the narrator is also portrayed as just as lost as his brother, for he lacks a true way to express himself and the pain of loosing his mother and baby daughter. At first, he refuses to believe that music is even capable of allowing this expressional freedom, and so he continues to search "for his identity in a hostile society and, in a social situation which invites fatalistic compliance," (Murray 353)
Music becomes a flow of pure emotion, therefore leaving him satisfied with his mode of transmitting his emotions to an audience. Therefore, Sonny is allowed the chance at redemption for his past sins as an addict and criminal, (Tackach 113)
This past also includes the much deeper pain of the shared African-American community in Harlem and elsewhere., "Baldwin's story ultimately signifies on, or repeats with a difference, the function of the blues as relating the history of Black culture in America in order to argue for a critical awareness among African-Americans of the historical contexts of their own cultural forms," (Sherard 691)
One of the main factors that impacts on James Baldwin's experience is that he is initially unaware that he lives in a racist society. He describes this in his essay saying, I knew about the south, of course, and about how southerners treated Negroes and how they expected them to behave, but it never entered my mind that anyone would look at me and expect me to behave that way (Baldwin 56)
Black refers to the American Negroes and white refers to white men, the Americans. These Americans were originally discontented Europeans (Baldwin 1955) who came to the New World - which later became the North American continent - and found the Blacks there
Through talking to this man, and listening to the language of blues in a nearby black bar, the narrator reconnects somewhat to his old brother, self, and memories of childhood. (Reilly, 1974) Also in "Sonny's Blues," Baldwin uses the image from the book of Isaiah of the cup of trembling featured in that particular Biblical tale to symbolize the suffering and trouble that Sonny has experienced in his life
" The narrator notes, As the singing filled the air, the watching, listening faces underwent a change, the eyes focusing on something within; the music seemed to soothe a poison out of them; and time seemed, nearly, to fall away from the sullen, belligerent, battered faces as though there were fleeing back to their first condition, while dreaming of their last. (Baldwin 18) Later on in the story, the narrator sees that the music that Sonny plays has a similar cathartic effect on not only Sonny, but also those listening to him play, including the narrator
Hughes also uses terms that insinuate movement and create rhythm and flow within the poem. For example, "[droning] a drowsy syncopated tune/Rocking back and forth to a mellow croon" gives the poem a relaxed feel that does not appear to be too hurried or too loud (Hughes lines 1-2)
Like in "The Weary Blues," Sonny uses his music to tell others the hardships that he has had to endure without asking the listener to have pity for him, but to rather use the experience as a guide for their own lives. Sonny's "blues" force the narrator to accept that he must let Sonny live according to his own terms and that there is nothing that anyone can do to separate him from his life-sustaining music (Reilly 59)
It is quite easy to empathize with John and his growing up, because it has happened to everyone, and his struggles indicate that regardless of race, we all have the same insecurities and longings as we turn from children into adults. John thinks to himself, "And he wanted to be one of them, playing in the streets, unfrightened, moving with such grace and power, but he knew this could not be" (Baldwin 30)
However, they do not always reflect the social reality. To determine membership within any given category the experience and actions of the individual must be considered (Brown 658)
"The outsider, unable to express himself, seeking a universal language as a mask of difference and a means of communication -- such are often the experiences of the American living abroad. These are also the experiences of some gay men in heterosexual society, and it was Baldwin's gift to express both at the same time" (Capozzola
. He constantly lives in need of 'justification,' for fear that what he feels, says, or does, will be judged unacceptable by some criterion he dimly perceives but whose exact nature escapes him" (Chaitin 166)
The initial and compelling rejection of the person through the distinction of his sexual preference and, or, experience results in an early and traumatic alienation. Giovanni's Room brought Baldwin into the limelight and, also, out of the closet (Ehrenstein 61)