Sonny's Blues - Characters

Characters

• Sonny is the main character's brother. The reader sees him through his brother’s eyes, as a quiet, introspective person with a tendency to withdraw inside himself. Sonny is also described by the narrator as wild, but not crazy. He has a heroin addiction, which led him to jail, but because of his passion for jazz, he became a musician.
• Sonny’s brother is the narrator and main character; his name is never mentioned throughout the story. He is a high school algebra teacher and family man. Unlike Sonny who is constantly struggling with his feelings, he chooses to ignore his own pain.
• Isabel is Sonny’s sister-in-law, she is open and talkative. After Sonny’s mother died, he lived with Isabel in her parents' house for a while, while his brother was in the army.
• Creole is a bass player who leads the band that Sonny plays in at the end of the story. He functions as a kind of father figure for Sonny.
• Sonny's Mother
• Sonny's Father
• Sonny's Uncle (His father's brother)
• Sonny's Friend