Sonny's Blues

Everything you should know about Sonny's Blues to help  you: LINK

Complete project LINK

Over the next two weeks we will be reading Sonny's Blues

We will be creating a story board.

Here is the full text

Here are Enotes

Parts of interest for AP test:

I:  James Baldwin Biography 

II: Plot Overview 

III: Socio-historical setting 

a. Growing Up in Harlem

b. Military Service

c.  Jazz Music, Class Divisions and Racial Politics   

IV: Characterization

a. Sonny, the artist

b. The narrator

c. The story’s final scenes and how they develop the narrator’s changes

V:  Imagery

VI:  Themes

Questions for Understanding "Sonny's Blues"

1.     What is meant by the word "blues" in the title?  What are Sonny's blues?

2.     What are the narrator's emotions when he reads the news about Sonny in the newspaper?  How would you describe the relationship between these two brothers?

3.     What is the narrator's occupation?  How is his occupation significant vis-à-vis Sonny's story?

4.     What event in the narrator's life acts as a catalyst to encourage him to contact Sonny in prison? 

5.     Why, according to the narrator, were Sonny and his father estranged from one another? 

6.     What does the narrator's mother believe to be his responsibility to Sonny? 

7.     What is the significance of the scene with the street singers?

8.     Give two different explanations for why Sonny leaves Isabel's family's home while the narrator is in the military. (One explanation would be from Isabel's/narrator's perspective, the other from Sonny's).

9.     What might be some reasons for why the narrator buys Sonny a drink at the end of the story?