Compare and Contrast the 2 Brothers in Sonnys Blues Essays

The story, Sonny’s Blues, describes the lives of two brothers growing up in Harlem in the early 1960’s. Sonny and his brother are different in the way the go about life in general. They were both raised in the same household, yet they grew up to be totally different people. As the story progresses we see that both brothers have troubles in their lives and we get to see how each thinks and acts when facing such ordeals. While the brothers differ in the way they internalize and cope with their problems, they both show selfish characteristics, but ultimately feel remorseful for not being in each others’ lives. The narrator though an educator, is not very good at verbalizing his emotions. He tends to be the person who keeps everything inside†¦show more content†¦At first he turns to music to fix his problems, and then heroin. Sonny left school, and joined the navy to get as far away from Harlem as he possibly could. When Sonny returns from prison, he tried e xplaining to his brother what music does for him, â€Å"Its not so much to play. Its to stand it, to be able to make it at all. On any level(Baldwin). He frowned and smiled: In order to keep from shaking to pieces.† He didn’t want to be a prisoner of Harlem anymore, but became a prisoner to heroin. At first Sonny did not feel that heroin was necessarily a bad thing, â€Å"It makes you feel-in control. Sometimes youve got to have that feeling (Baldwin). Sonny feels that even while all doped up on heroin, he feels in control of his life and his circumstances. Even though Sonny takes on different approaches in finding sense in his life; whether through the army, music, or heroin, they do not realistically solve any of his problems they just mask his confusion and indecision temporarily. In my opinion the narrator, is a very selfish man, he only cares about his feelings and not those around him. The narrator broke his promise to his mother to take care of Sonny, â€Å"Two days later I was married, and then I was gone. And I had a lot of things on my mind and I pretty well forgot my promise to Mama until I got shipped home on a special furlough for her funeral† (Baldwin). The narrator’s mother wanted the boys to be close, because they will only