“Sonny’s Blues” takes place in 1950s Harlem, a New York neighborhood known as the center of urban black life in America at the time. Widely considered to be one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century, Baldwin’s influence lives on in writers like Toni Morrison and Joan Didion. Openly gay, he was also known for his frank treatment of taboo subjects like homosexuality and interracial relationships. Baldwin, the grandson of a slave, was a prolific voice of the civil rights movement due to the overriding concern in his stories and essays with racism in America. Though Baldwin is best known as a novelist and essayist, he was also a playwright, a poet, a critic, and a writer of short stories. Baldwin would revisit Europe throughout his life, citing its importance in giving him perspective on his experiences in America and liberating him to write about controversial American themes. At 19, Baldwin began devoting himself seriously to writing, publishing essays and short stories whose success led him to move to Paris in 1948 on a fellowship. This abuse, as well as the persistent racism Baldwin experienced while growing up, had a deep influence on his writing. He was raised by his mother and step-father, a Baptist minister who abused and ridiculed him. Baldwin was born in 1924 in the New York neighborhood of Harlem.
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