In "Sonny's Blues" Sonny was the youngest child in his family and after his parents died when he was young his big brother made a promise that he would look after him. Unfortunately, Sonny chooses the wrong path at first and gets involved in drugs and has to go to a rehabilitation center to get better. After he gets out his brother asks him "What do you want to do?"(47), to which Sonny replies "I'm going to be a musician. (47)" Sonny's brother doubts his aspirations from the beginning and even tells himself that "(he) never played the role of the older brother quite so seriously

Paul was a bit younger and had different circumstances that stopped him from completely reaching his goals. With the money he went to New York and stayed in a hotel and dined extravagantly and basically lived like he had always seen how the soprano's that came to Carnegie Hall lived. Paul had went to school and told his classmates of how well he knew these members of the stock company and when his classmates were obviously bored with the stories, he would tell his wild dreams of how he was "going to travel for a while; going to Naples, to Venice, to Egypt (408)." At the end of the story with Paul's quest to "find himself" coming to an end with himself sleeping on railroad tracks, he is awakened by an approaching train. Right when the train was about to hit him he jumps and flashing "through his brain, clearer than ever before, the blue Adriatic water, the yellow of Algerian sands (414-415)" this signified that he had experienced his fantasy of living the life that he wanted.

In "Paul's Case" Paul was the only child in his family and because his mother died he has only his father's influence on his life. We join Paul in the story while he is getting in trouble, much like how Sonny was in trouble at first. Much like "Sonny's Blues" Paul sees himself facing his teachers and they are questioning him as to why he was misbehaving. At one point a teacher inquires about a remark that Paul had made, Paul replied, "I didn't mean to be polite or impolite either. I guess it's a sort of way I have about saying things regardless. (401)" The teacher influences in the stories feel dissatisfied with their influences on the boys, but they are not taking into account that they cannot force these boys to grow up faster than they want to grow up themselves. They can only hope to point them in the right direction.

Overall, both stories

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1242
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)