Dystopian America in Revolutionary Road and ‘Sonny’s Blues’

Abstract

America as a nation is often associated with values of freedom, nationalism, and the optimistic pursuit of dreams. However, in Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates and ‘Sonny’s Blues’ by James Baldwin, the authors display a pessimistic view of America as a land characterised by suffering and entrapment, supporting the view of literary critic Leslie Fiedler that American literature is one ‘of darkness and the grotesque’. Through the contrasting communities of white middle-class suburbia and Harlem, the authors depict a dystopian America, where characters are stripped of their agency and forced to rely on illusions, false appearances, or escape in order to survive. Both ‘Sonny’s Blues’ and Revolutionary Road confirm that despite America’s appearance as ‘a land of light and affirmation’, it hides a much darker reality.