A Look at James Baldwin's “Sonny's Blues” Michael Clark, in a critical analysis essay he wrote on James Baldwin's “Sonny's Blues”, examines the ways in which Baldwin uses images of light and darkness to tell the story of two brother's. Thus, being Sonny and his elder brother. Clark points out in his essay that Sonny finds his life a living hell, yet he knows enough to try and strive for better, for that saving light. He also believes that Sonny sees music as something positive and by not mastering music will result in a downfall in his life. Not only does Clark express his point of view on Sonny and his older brother, he also has the idea that the brothers' father, mother, uncle, and the elder brother's daughter Gracie each represented
After going through experimental drug treatment, which were unsuccessful, Mrs. Adkins decided to contact Dr. Kevorkian. Janet Adkins was still living her life as normal as any other healthy person. She was not debilitated by her illness. According to Dr. Murray Raskind, Mrs Adkins personal physician, she and her husband belong to a right to die organization, known as the Hemlock Society, and that Janet Adkins did not have the patience for the Alzheimer treatment that Dr. Murray had administered. It is claimed that Janet did not want to continue living her life if her illness could not be haulted.
Vladimir Santana In the Story "The Scarlet Ibis" by James Hurst The narrator and Doodle had close relationship with each other after training with his brother, who was the only one who cared about him. The actions of the narrator throughout the story show he is not primarily responsible for the death of his younger brother Doodle, because its was the fault of thier treatment, them not caring about thier own son, and having no responbility. The parents have little expectations for Doodle because he was handicaped. Doodle brother conveys this by stating "Mama, Crying told me that even if William Armstrong lived, he would never do these things with me". (pg.430) The narrator is proving us that Doodle would not be able to do the things that his
He lives at the house of the Widow Douglas, who is taking care of him together with her sister, Miss Watson. Their unsuccessful attempts to "sivilize" him are some of the first attempts to change his morality. But like everybody else later in the story, nobody but Jim ever manages to influence him significally. Huck really is aware of his aunt’s efforts, but thinks civilized life is nothing for
Sonny's brother wouldn't listen or understand to what Sonny wanted.Later in the story they have a better relationship and Sonny's brother realizes that music helped Sonny through all of his suffering and it also helped them both as brothers to finally bring them closer together. Suffering is another important them throughout Sonny's blues.Sonny suffered with an addiction to drugs, Sonny's brother suffered when his daughter died with Polio and their father suffered when he watched his brother died and didn't do anything.They all handled their suffering in a different way whether it was with music or the way they would present themselves.Baldwin uses darkness and light as the darkness is Sonny suffering to his addiction and light as his brother being the educated one that lived life as what he thought was the right way to live it. Sonny's blues by James Baldwin has several themes.The theme of music and the theme of suffering were very important in this story because they all suffered in life and with their relationships.Music helped Sonny with his addiction and it also helped the brothers with their
‘The Yellow Wall-Paper’ Argues without Argument ‘The Yellow Wall-Paper’ is a complex short story told though the point of view of a sarcastic and insane protagonist, who has rapidly changing ideas about her surroundings, other characters and even her own psychological state. Because of this, readers may come to a variety of conclusions about major plot points and themes. Puzzled, readers will identify the piece as a horror story—a vivid portrayal of insanity with unsettling realism. This is indeed the conscious conclusion that Charlotte Perkins Gilman intends for her readers to form. However, the piece is so much more than a simple horror story; it is a deceptively hidden but powerful essay on female equality and marriage, two topics about which Gilman wrote frequently.
In “Sonny’s Blues” James Baldwin uses imagery and the theme of music to help strengthen the relationship between the narrator and his younger brother, Sonny. Throughout the story there is a continual struggle for the two brothers to understand each other. The narrator, who is the older brother, is an algebra teacher. He thinks that musicians and bar workers are the bottom of the barrel. The younger brother is Sonny, who at the beginning of the story is arrested for heroin and is also a jazz pianist.
John’s biggest downfall in this story is the fact that he is stuck with the unfortunate task of being not only his wife’s lover, but also her doctor. Instead of being a concerned husband and being there for his wife mentally, he took a more clinical attitude to the situation and there for our narrator was left to her own devises. Also John only knows the “pattern” of his wife and does not see the trapped woman with in. John truly care for his wife and is trying everything in his power to help and cure her. Unfortunately the only way he knows how to help her it by treating her as a medical patient or as an object and not as a person who needed love, not just care.
The wallpaper symbolizes and reflects the sanity of the main character. As the reader learns more and more about the wallpaper, the more the reader learns about the mental stability of Jane. Although there were many times those she subconsciously questions John’s methods using the wallpaper “unheard of contradictions” and “lame uncertain curves” alluding to the questionable methods that her husband uses to treat her. “John is a physician, and perhaps - (I would not say it to a living soul, of course, but this is dead paper and a great relief to my mind) - perhaps that is one reason I do not get well faster.” (Gilman.1892). And It is through the dead paper, her writing and self expression that the readers can sympathize with her plight as she says “I don't know why I should write this.
Gilman’s story begins with narrator telling readers about the way, in which her supposedly highly educated husband John (a physician) had decided to treat his wife’s mild depression. After having realized that something needed to be done, in order to improve his wife’s mental state, John could not come up with anything better but suggesting that there was only one effective way for the narrator to address her mental anxieties – indulging in bellyful idling, while remaining intellectually inactive for the duration of a ‘treatment’: “I take phosphates or phosphites - whichever it is, and tonics, and journeys, and air, and exercise, and am absolutely forbidden to "work" until I am well again” (1470). Despite the fact that author initially tried to express