The narrator seems to be quite disconnected from Sonny at the beginning of "Sonny's Blues." He doesn't even know that his brother has been arrested for taking (and possibly dealing) heroine until he reads the newspaper. When the narrator tells stories about Sonny's adolescence, he mentions that he was never particularly fond of Sonny's vision to become a jazz musician, and that seems to further support the observation that there is some distance between Sonny and the narrator.
The end of the story provides a completely different picture of their relationship. The narrator agrees to go to a nightclub with Sonny and watches him perform there with his friends. On page 136, he almost seems proud to be Sonny's brother:
"And it turned out that everyone at the bar knew Sonny, or almost everyone (...). I was introduced to them and they were all very polite to me. Here, I was in Sonny's world. Or, rather: his kingdom. Here, it was not even a question that his veins bore royal blood."
During the beginning and middle of the story, the narrator associates jazz with drugs because he thinks that some musicians have to be high in order to play. He does not consider performing jazz music as a respectable career and does not think that it will give Sonny a stable job. However, once the narrator gives him a chance, he realizes that other people respect Sonny and his jazz music. Perhaps this makes him reconsider his harsh judgement of Sonny's choice to become a musician.
Watching Sonny interact with the other musicians helps the narrator realize that Sonny is happy with those people. The joy that Sonny feels when he plays jazz music is contagious. After the performance, the narrator seems much happier. He thinks about his parents, uncle, and daughter and shows some emotion. He also seems to finally be accepting of the fact that his brother is a jazz musician.
The last scene of the story shows how jazz music bridges the gap between Sonny and the narrator even though in previous scenes, it seemed to help create the gap.
I agree with you about the change in the narrator's understanding of Sonny compared to the beginning and end of the story! I think that music here plays a crucial role, both for the readers to understand how the narrator feels, and for the narrator to finally begin to understand Sonny in what has been a very long time.
ReplyDeleteAt the end, I get the feeling that the narrator's eyes are finally open and are able to see inside Sonny's world; a world that is obviously so vastly different from his own. For Sonny, at first, heroin and jazz music helped provide him with an escape. But, after he was jailed, it seems like Sonny will begin to rely more on jazz music to provide him with that sense of relaxation and release. (I suppose math may be the narrator's escape...). In any case, I feel like the narrator is begining to understand this as he sees that Sonny has educated himself, but not in the conventional way.
ReplyDeleteThe narrator certainly has stereotypes about jazz musicians ("good-time people," etc.), and he's also uncomfortable with the idea of Sonny being part of a "world" he knows nothing about--down in Greenwich Village, hanging out with all these bohemian white people. But he doesn't seem to connect the jazz scene with heroin initially (although there would have been good reason to do so)--there's plenty of heroin in their neighborhood, and remember, Sonny is introduced to it by the friend we meet at the start of the story. Later, when he's trying to "understand" where Sonny is coming from, he does ask about the suffering and the "need" to be high in order to play. But, curiously, his initial worries about his brother pursuing music don't explicitly have to do with drugs.
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