Answers to Questions for Sonny’s Blues & A Worn Path

 

Answers for "Sonny's Blues":

1. "Sonny's Blues," is told from Sonny's brother's point of view. Sonny's brother does not fully understand why Sonny became a heroin addict and why Sonny chooses the things he does. This affects the story, because Sonny's brother finally understands Sonny and his life and what he has been through.
   
2. The older brother's profession is an algebra teacher. The fact that he is a teacher suggests that his personality is caring and helpful. He wants to help Sonny beat his problem and addiction.
   
3. The story would be changed if it were told by Sonny; by we would know more about his experience and how he felt. Also, Sonny's point of view would be a lot darker and deeper. Since, Sonny was under the influence in part of the story, he would be considered as an unreliable narrator.
   
4. He decided to write Sonny when his little girl, Gracie, died from polio.
   
5. The narrator's mother asked him to look out for Sonny and watch him. He tries to keep his promise to her by making Sonny stay with Isabel and her family while he is away. But, Sonny ends up dropping out of school and joins the navy. When they got back the older brother tried to help Sonny, but all they did was fight and finally he gave up on Sonny. Then he tries to help Sonny again, by letting him stay at his house after he got clean.
   
6. The names of the major characters affect the story, by showing that they were close. The names of these major characters were Mama, Daddy, and Sonny, relates to the fact that everyone has a family, which connects the story to the audience. The fact that the older brother was not named puts the reader themselves in the story.
   
7. The statement "Now these are Sonny's blues," shows that he is finally ready to let go and be free of his addiction to heroin, his suffering. Sonny made his music his own by telling his story through music. Sonny's blues makes people become free of all their grief and sufferings in life.
   

Answers for "A Worn Path":

1. The narrator is a non participant who is impartial omniscience. The narrator is not a character in the story, therefore he or she is a non participant, and he or she is impartial omniscience because he or she describes and presents the thoughts and actions of Phoenix Jackson.
   
2. The significance of the old woman being named Phoenix Jackson is that she may have once been a slave and never learned to read or write, also she probably did not know her real name, therefore she was named after cities Phoenix and Jackson.
   
3. This technique contributes to the stories effect, because Phoenix is very old and is starting to forget things. In some ways she may not be able to tell reality from her dreams.
   
4. Phoenix is treated with kindness by the white people she meets, they understand she is old and needs a little help doing things. The story takes place in the south at the end of the depression.
   
5. She admires that he is not scared of anybody. This attitude tells us that she is a brave woman and that she admires people who are not afraid of anything.
   

This statement shows reveals that she may be going through a hallucination again. It seems as if she is thinking of something else and her mind was in a different place.