The use of first person narrative in "Sonny's Blues" helps to portray the thoughts and emotions of a man facing the difficult streets of Harlem. The author, James Baldwin, tells a story that depicts the challenges for a young man and his brother Sonny. He writes about their childhood and the hardships that they encountered, and because it is written from the narrator's thoughts, the reader is able to fully appreciate the character's feelings and experiences. It provides a greater understanding of how the situations actually affected him and it emotionally ties the reader to the story. The narrator writes little about his own life, but recites incidents of his brother's life to reveal the challenges of Harlem.
The narrator develops the character of his brother throughout the story. When he first find out that his brother, Sonny, has been arrested for drugs, he recalls the innocent boy that he remembers from his childhood. ".his face had been bright and open, there was a lot of copper in it; and he"d had wonderfully direct brown eyes, and great gentleness and privacy" (117). The reader experiences the story through the narrator, and thus begins to see Sonny's character as he does. He believed his brother was full of potential and he was shocked to find out that his brother had fallen into this kind of trouble. He says, "I couldn't believe it: but what I mean by that is that I couldn't find any room for it anywhere inside me" (117). The reader feels the anguish and confusion of the narrator and tries to understand the situation as he does. He then takes the reader back through his memories and they experience them together, while trying to make sense of the situation. .
As the story progresses, the narrator continues to face the challenge of understanding his brother, understanding why Sonny doesn't care and why he chooses the things that he does. He feels an obligation to look after his little brother because of his mother's request that he do so, but he finds that he may not know exactly how to do that.
