In the case of Baldwin’s essay, the kind of primary sources that are valuable for a research essay on literature which we will be doing later this semester:
Look up the Biblical reference to “the cup of trembling” at the end of “Sonny’s Blues.” What does this reference and “Sonny Blues” speak to concerning Baldwin’s view of Black Americans’ struggles in America?
Read the following quote from an essay by James Baldwin called, “The Artist’s Struggle for Integrity” (1962) and consider how his short story, “Sonny’s Blues” and his poem “The Giver” illustrate these ideas. Find a statement in either one or both and explain the connection.
Most people live in almost total darkness… people, millions of people whom you will never see, who don’t know you, never will know you, people who may try to kill you in the morning, live in a darkness which — if you have that funny terrible thing which every artist can recognize and no artist can define — you are responsible to those people to lighten, and it does not matter what happens to you. You are being used in the way a crab is useful, the way sand certainly has some function. It is impersonal. This force which you didn’t ask for, and this destiny which you must accept, is also your responsibility. And if you survive it, if you don’t cheat, if you don’t lie, it is not only, you know, your glory, your achievement, it is almost our only hope — because only an artist can tell, and only artists have told since we have heard of man, what it is like for anyone who gets to this planet to survive it. What it is like to die, or to have somebody die; what it is like to be glad. Hymns don’t do this, churches really cannot do it. The trouble is that although the artist can do it, the price that he has to pay himself and that you, the audience, must also pay, is a willingness to give up everything, to realize that although you spent twenty-seven years acquiring this house, this furniture, this position, although you spent forty years raising this child, these children, nothing, none of it belongs to you. You can only have it by letting it go. You can only take if you are prepared to give, and giving is not an investment. It is not a day at the bargain counter. It is a total risk of everything, of you and who you think you are, who you think you’d like to be, where you think you’d like to go — everything, and this forever, forever.
If you wish to read more of this essay or hear the complete text in a recording of a talk Baldwin gave at New York City’s Community Church on November 29, 1962 go to the following:
https://www.brainpickings.org/2016/04/13/james-baldwin-the-artists-struggle-for-integrity/?mc_cid=24979b8129&mc_eid=f53c5573d6
Listen on Youtube to the following:
“Am I Blue?” the song Sonny plays in the story. There are many artists who have done this song; one of the best is by Ray Charles in a 7- minute version recorded in Japan in 1976.
Louis Armstrong’s version of “Why Am I So Black and Blue?”
Anything by Charlie Parker, the musician whose work Sonny admired.
These will give you a good idea of the music that fills “Sonny’s Blues.” If you are interested listen also to one of the most beautiful jazz compositions: John Coltrane’s “A Love Supreme.” It speaks to the heart of the story for me.
And here are some more protest songs to share:
“Glory to Hong Kong”
Cantonese version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulera9c18F0
English version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPCyAFo_k80
“Island’s Sunrise” for Taiwan
Venezuela Song, by P. Herrero And J.L Armenteros,
My blood is Palestinian
https://youtu.be/S-1KDZTNty4 [youtu.be]
https://youtu.be/-3GTa_EhZJ8 [youtu.be]
My Homeland ( MAWTINI)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TAYl9S5Xvj8&feature=youtu.be [youtu.be]