View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. To what does the narrator compare the outside world?

2. Which of the following do the narrator and Sonny drink together?

3. From what does Grace die?

4. What message does the narrator posit Creole has for Sonny?

5. To what is Sonny’s experience compared?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does the narrator depict the performer’s experience of music?

2. Why does the narrator express misgivings about Sonny going into music?

3. What revelation does Sonny report from listening to the sidewalk revival?

4. What effect does Grace’s death have on Isabel?

5. Why does Sonny make a point of smoking in front of the narrator after his mother’s death?

6. What does the narrator perceive Creole asserting “the blues were all about” (47)?

7. Why does the narrator posit that passers-by doubt the holiness of those conducting the sidewalk revival?

8. How does the narrator depict the common experience of hearing music?

9. What effect does the narrator notice the sidewalk revival has on its attendees?

10. How does Isabel realize that Sonny has left?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Overall, what is the most important theme of “Sonny’s Blues”? What in the text indicates as much? How does it do so?

Essay Topic 2

To what genre other than jazz fiction might “Sonny’s Blues” be considered to belong? What in the text supports that identification? How does it do so?

Essay Topic 3

Assuming that “Sonny’s Blues” should be standard reading for a given class and level, what class and what level? Why that class and why that level? What in the text suggests as much, and how does it do so?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 527 words (approx. 2 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample