4. • James Arthur Baldwin in full.
• was an essayist, playwright, and a novelist.
• was born on August 2, 1924 in Harlem, New York.
• He is the eldest of nine children
• was born to a young single mother, Emma Jones, at Harlem Hospital.
• His stepfather named as David Baldwin
• He became a preacher during his teen years.
• He attended DeWitt Clinton High School in the Bronx
• At eighteen, he took a job working for the New Jersey railroad.
• Baldwin moved to Greenwich Village
• His two famous works are:
Go tell it to the Mountain
Giovanni’s Room
• He died on December 1, 1987 due to stomach cancer.
5. “Sonny’s Blues”
• The story talks about Sonny’s
struggles and sufferings.
• Am I Blue, is the last song that
Sonny played as his way to express
his sufferings and pain from
darkness.
7. The story is all about the two brothers, the eldest is an algebra
teacher and the younger named Sonny. The story begins with the school
teacher who just read in a newspaper that his brother was arrested for
using and selling heroine. The school teacher didn’t got the chance to write
Sonny to jail after they had a huge fight back then. The older brother keeps
on reminiscing about their childhood and how Sonny’s grew up with Isabel’s
family. After the older brother’s little daughter named Gracie buried, he
sent his first letter to Sonny. After got out from jail, Sonny lived with his
older brother in Harlem along with his wife named Isabel and kids. Sonny
once invited his older brother to watch him play in the nightclub and where
his older brother felt connected with what Sonny’s really feel behind his
sufferings and pain in the darkness. The story ended how Sonny played Am I
Blue to the crowd which his older brother realized how meaningful the
music and instruments are for Sonny and that it became his outlet in
expressing his pain and sufferings and prevent himself from loneliness.
10. The story took place in Harlem Newyork in the year 1950’s
PRESENT
-Early morning at Subway Station
-Early morning at School
FLASHBACK
- Apartment down- town
PRESENT
- Bar
- School Courtyard
- Park
- 110 street rolling up Lenox avenue
FLASHBACK
- Their House
- Road down to hill
- Greenwich village
- Greece
PRESENT
-Seventh Avenue
-Barbeque joint
-Night club
15. EXPOSITION
The narrator, Sonny’s older brother who was a teacher,
was on his way to the school. He was at the subway when he
received a newspaper and surprisingly saw the name of Sonny
who was arrested for using and selling heroin. He couldn’t
believe it, even Sonny’s friend- a drug user-who know him as a
smart kid. At the school he was too occupied about what he
have read from the news to the point that he started listening
to curses from students outside downstairs as if it was they
were feeling at that moment.
16. COMPLICATION
-When Sonny’s older brother remembered that he should take
care of his younger brother because the world was cruel and
what and even when they get old, he must still take care of his
younger brother.
17. CRISIS
After their mother’s funeral, he asked Sonny,
what he wants to do in his life. He told him he wanted to
be a musician, a jazz musician. He couldn’t believe it, he
was so against the idea of Sonny becoming a musician.
He wasn’t so sure about what Sonny wants to do with his
life, if he could have a better life if he would pursue what
he wants.
18. CLIMAX
Sonny confessed everything about him using
drugs when he heard the girl who’s singing religious
songs outside their apartment. Her voice reminded him
of what heroin feels like. He said he needed it in order
for him to play, to gain confidence and prevent himself
from shaking to pieces while playing.
19. DENOUEMENT
He invited his older brother to go with him in
the nightclub and watch him play what he really
wants, piano.
20. ENDING
After they performed on stage, the narrator
realized how passionate Sonny is in his musical
instrument. He finally understood why he chose
this path and his love to music.
22. Person VS. Person
It arises between the
brothers
Person VS. Society
The racism that is
happening in their place
and the difficulty of how
to survive with it.
Person VS. self
Both brothers have deal
with their own demons.
23. :theme of the story
• Art
• Brother's Love
• Suffering
• Redemption
• Racism
• Imprisonment
24. TONE BEGINNING: schock, scared
and sad
MIDDLE: heart-wrenching,
sense of being responsible,
concern, and scared
ENDING: amused, , happy
and sense of enlightenment
GENERAL TONE: symphatic
27. Visual Imagery
• His face had been bright and open, there was a lot of copper in it; and he’d had
wonderfully direct brown eyes.
• These streets hadn’t changed, though housing projects jutted out of them now like
rocks in the middle of a boiling sea.
• It was nice to see her face so vivid again.
• It looks like a parody of the good, clean, faceless life.
Kinesthetic Imagery
• A great block of ice got settled in my belly and kept melting there slowly all day
long.
• It kept melting, sending trickles of ice water all up and down my veins, but it never
got less.
• The darkness outside is what the old folks have been talking about. It’s what
they’ve come from. It’s what they endure.
28. Tactile Imagery
• "Even if their fingers had been a thousand times more gentle than human fingers
ever are, he could hardly help feeling that they had stripped him naked naked and
were spitting on that nakedness"
Olfactory Imagery
• He smelled funky.
Auditory Imagery
• “It wasn’t like living with a person at all, it was like living with sound.”
30. EMOTION
Through out the
story, the narrator and sonny are
constantly struggling in their life
and the sequence events unfolded
between the two of them They
both physically and emotionally.
MENTAL CAPACITY
Sonny's character is
perceived as a confused and lost
young boy by the people around
him because sonny is typical dry
addicted using the drugs. And his
curiosity led to his bad habit.
31. PERSPECTIVE AND OPINION
The story is
craftily written using lightness
and darkness as a symbols
through out the entire story.
his brother focuses Sonny's
blue's.
LANGUAGE
In Sonny's blue's and the
narrator . Language using is
music because both them
playing music. The narrator
sees his brother Sonny's playing
piano, music and he wanted
that Sonny's continue to learned
playing with his music and
piano.
32. VERBAL AND NON-
VERBAL COMMUNICATION
In the story Sonny
as someone who has been
talkative, and funny. When
he was playing piano it was
releasing the emotions
while he was performing
with the fellow musicians.
BELIEF OF PHILOSOPHY
Sonny's and the narrator. Are
not similarly experience because
Sonny's is tied up in prison in his
addiction but his brother they
believe that Sonny's will change his
life and his addiction will disappear
and it will change.
33. EXPERIENCE AND HISTORY
The story
discover a lot of difficulties,
circumstances and disagreement.
The narrator always worried and
thinking his brother Sonny's
because his younger brother
Sonny's has been drug addicted
using heroin. The narrator
always remember Sonny's
because he loves his brother
Sonny's when their mother died.
BIOLOGY AND MOVEMENT
The relationship
between two brother Sonny's has
fallen into the drug cycle of
harlem the narrator he tried to
not repeat his mistakes because
of his drug addicted using the
drugs.
34. CONFLICT
The conflict in the story the narrator he endured the sequence
events, struggle and suffer to his brother Sonny's the narrator
experience in his inability to respect Sonny's choices and views. The
narrator was worried about the future of Sonny's because if his
addiction he has inability to understand Sonny's drugs and life as a
musician.
GOAL, DESIRE, AND ASPIRATIONS
The story of two brother have a passion Sonny's has a dream to
become a jazz musician. And the narrator he was a teaching algebra.
35. Birth, Growth, and Death
The narrator he remember the last day he saw his
mother before he left them to go to the army her mother told
him to watch out of his young brother and to take care of his
brother Sonny's.
37. PERMANENCE
"Sonny's Blues," first published in 1957,
was collected in James Baldwin's Going to Meet the
Man in 1965.
ARTISTRY
The author’s use “Music” as aesthetic
appeal to the reader.
SUGGESTIVESS
"You got to hold on to your brother," she
said, "and don't let him fall, no matter what it
looks like is happening and no matter how evil you
gets with him."
40. MORAL
LESSON
• Be sensitive on what words you say, every
individual has its own story.
• Sufferings are present, but don’t let it
stop you from moving forward.
• Be someone who supports someone’s
dreams and goals.
41. OPINION
• The narrator said that “People can’t always do exactly what they want to do” but I
totally disagree and if I am Sonny, I would say the same as what he actually said to
his brother the narrator, “People ought to do what they want to do what else are
they alive for?’ but sad to say in reality we can’t really do what we want to do
because we should think what is practical for us to survive.
• The narrator was against to Sonny’s dream to be a jazz musician because how can he
make it as a living? He wants to control Sonny not for his own good but for Sonny’s
future and when Sonny talks about his reason, the narrator just hearing it and don’t
want to listen.
• The brothers are lacking of connection with their relationship. Especially the
narrator, he doesn’t seem to understand his brothers suffering. Maybe because of
the pressure put on him to look after his younger brother Sonny.
42. LIKES ABOUT THE STORY
• “You may not be able to stop
nothing from happening, but
you got to let him know you’d
there” The mother’s advice to
his son the narrator.
• When finally, the narrator truly
hears Sonny for the first time.
DISLIKES ABOUT THE
STORY
• How the narrator abandons
Sonny while he was suffering
and just tries to reconnect
again with him when he had
already experienced suffering
too because of his daughter's
death.
43. CONFUSING PART OF THE STORY
The ending is unclear whether Sonny will continue to suffer or
whether he finally find his peace.
