WHO: James Baldwin
WHAT: Writer and lecturer on racial issues
WHEN: Born August 2, 1924; died December 1, 1987
WHERE: Born in New York City; died in Saint-Paul-de-Vence, France
WORK WE HAVE HERE AT LC:
The Fire Next Time: "Two letters, written on the occasion of the centennial of the Emancipation Proclamation, that exhort Americans, both black and white, to attack the terrible legacy of racism."
Go Tell It on the Mountain: "The story of John Grimes, a young man living in Harlem in the 1930's. His relationship with his strict preacher-father, Gabriel, who moved from the South to escape his past, is the central focus of this compelling drama."
Giovanni's Room: "Set in the contemporary Paris of American expatriate liaisons, and violence, a young man finds himself caught between desire and conventional morality."
Another Country: "Rufus, a gifted African-American musician, Leona, the woman who loves him, his sister Ida, and her lover Vivaldo, struggle with issues of love, hate, gender, and racism in Greenwich Village, Harlem, France, and other locales in the early part of the twentieth century."
WORDS: “I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.” (from The Fire Next Time)
“Perhaps home is not a place but simply an irrevocable condition.” (Giovanni's Room)
“We all commit our crimes. The thing is to not lie about them -- to try to understand what you have done, why you have done it. That way, you can begin to forgive yourself. That's very important. If you don't forgive yourself you'll never be able to forgive anybody else and you'll go on committing the same crimes forever.” (Another Country)
“But to look back from the stony plain along the road which led one to that place is not at all the same thing as walking on the road; the perspective to say the very least, changes only with the journey; only when the road has, all abruptly and treacherously, and with an absoluteness that permits no argument, turned or dropped or risen is one able to see all that one could not have seen from any other place.” (Go Tell It on the Mountain)