Humans are made of tangibles; flesh and blood, muscles and bones, cells and nerves. Human survival can be broken down into purely scientific, emotionless and naive aspects. The value of anatomy clearly cannot be underestimated, as it constitutes the lowest foundation of existence. However, when unaccompanied by that which offers grace and comfort, joy and purpose, and, above all, love and understanding, this foundation grants only that: existence. A limp and dispassionate wandering through life at its most bare is a weak prospect, and yet it is the only one confronting the character of Sonny in James Baldwin's Sonny's Blues, if he follows the in the wake of his older brother. Say no to plagiarism. . Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an original essay Although some condemn Sonny's drug use as an example of pathetic weakness, it is much more than that; it's the opening of a child in the dark, grasping for a glow he knows is false, but he grabs it anyway because he desperately needs something to squeeze in his otherwise empty fist . Sonny is not the same as his older brother; his soul is no longer the same. Sonny has the soul of an artist, the suffering of an artist. Baldwin describes Sonny as a character who has no alternative to drugs, as a tragic hero with the soul of an artist, through Sonny's suffering and his home. Throughout Sonny's Blues, Baldwin illustrates the notion of suffering as inevitably hovering above all of his characters; everyone suffers in one way or another – from heartbreak, from poverty, from addiction, from limited opportunities in life. All the characters certainly experience agony, but none of them knows salvation, although they all seek it in their own way. Sonny's brother achieves this by starting a family, having a career, and creating a home. However, despite the unequivocal value of this, none of this offers salvation to the brother; he still lives in a housing project in Harlem, which makes him wonder when bringing Sonny home if he is "just dragging him back into the danger he had almost died from trying to escape" (Baldwin 840) . He who is not stuck in the stormy sea of ​​addiction is not free. He makes the decisions he feels are best for him, and it's easy to look at those choices and wonder why Sonny doesn't make them too, why he chooses heroin. Sonny and his brother are not the same, their sufferings and souls are too different, and they require different ways of coping. “Heroin… when it [is] in [the] veins… makes [one] feel both warm and cool. And distant… and of course… it gives [one] the feeling of control… it’s [it’s] putting up with it, being able to do it. At all levels… to avoid trembling” (853-854). This is the feeling Sonny is addicted to, the only faint semblance of comfort he finds. The tragic irony is that Sonny finds this facade of consolation in music, his passion, but a passion tainted by vice. This only perpetuates his suffering. In Sonny's Blues, Baldwin closely links the themes of suffering and home. Home is a physical place in Sonny's Blues, but it is also an idea. It is a place of escape, a place of return, a place with memories both horrible and wonderful. Home is a mixture of comfort, conflict, sorrow, suffering and kindness. It's an apartment and it's a nightclub. Its residents are both a real and created family. Home is literal but also symbolic, because in many ways home is simply the feeling.