Idea Paper

For my first paper, I want to write about Sonny’s stepfather Cloyd and share his character descriptions and personality traits. I also want to talk about his relationship with Sonny and how his life has changed since moving in with him. I plan on writing this paper using the Reader Response theory, which is reader’s experience from reading the text. Since I have become so engaged in reading this novel, I feel that I will have no problem picturing what is going on in the between Cloyd and Sonny. I get so excited when Cloyd and Sonny get into arguments, when Cloyd uses profanity to show his anger while using it, and ht this racial slurs toward no whites. I am not a racist or anything I just feel that the book is that much more interesting partly because I cannot believe how much of a bigot that Cloyd is. Besides being a racist some other personality traits about him are positive including masculinity (being tough and hunting, hanging things on the walls of his home), being a gentleman when he  tells Sonny to shake that guys hand with a firm grip, or living conservatively (eating at the fancy dinner table). However, there are also negative characteristics about Cloyd that go along with his racism. He is rude, selfish, and very controlling of Sonny. We begin to witness Cloyd’s rudeness when Sonny overhears him on the phone saying,” I love to eat them tacos, and now I even got myself married to a pretty little Mexican gal.” (51) I found this very rude and selfish for Cloyd to say about his wife Silvia. This act shows that he does not care about her and thinks that it’s ok to use her for her pretty looks and cooking. Women do not deserve to be treated this way. Ever since Cloyd has been married to Silvia, he has treated Sonny like crap. He has taken advantage of him by not paying him for all the work that he does for him. He also does not show him the respect that he deserves. I understand that Sonny didn’t mind not getting paid for the chores that he was assigned at first, but realized how much of a jerk Cloyd was when he did not pay him for one of the jobs that he said he would pay him for. Another job that Sonny got frustrated over because it was pure torture was chopping down a bunch of weeds around the complex. Sonny overheard Cloyd talking to his mother about the job and stated, “I had to learn responsibility, how I had to earn my right to stay here. That he was teaching me to be a man.” (63) It seems like Cloyd is just controlling and taking advantage of Sonny to flex his power and authority. He wants to torture him by doing brutal chores because he knows that he can get away with it and will not have to do them himself. He tries to convince Sonny that by doing these tough chores and not getting paid he is earning his keep and becoming a man. In reality, he is just using Sonny and this gives him an excuse to get rid of him for a while since Cloyd not liking him very much.