This passage also, of course, reflects Sonny's particular struggle. He tells his brother at one point that the feeling heroine gave him at many times was a feeling of being in control, and that it was important for him to have that feeling sometimes. The rest of the world, it is made clear, does not actually give either sonny or his brother a great deal of control, and though both brothers join the military during "the war" (presumably World War II), there is no sense of a wider world of possibilities, but only the darkness and bleakness that exists in Harlem. Heroine provided a sense of control, perhaps, but it is obviously a false impression -- it is actually the cause of Sonny's true, physical imprisonment. It can be seen as part of the ceiling that the young men of Harlem bump their heads into as they grow up in...
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