James Baldwin

Over the course of numerous novels, essays, and plays, James Baldwin examined the conscience of a racially divided America before, during, and after the height of the Civil Rights movement. Needing to escape from his country in order to see it more clearly, Baldwin, still in his twenties, left America—and the dead ends proffered by what he saw as its fundamentally racist culture—for Paris. Living by his wits and off a bit of grant money, he wrote what are arguably three of his best works there within three years. In his first two novels, Go Tell It on the Mountain and Giovanni's Room, Baldwin dealt with, respectively, the legacy of his familial past and the complexities of his homosexuality. Between these two books, he published his first collection of essays, Notes of a Native Son, a blistering tour de force of criticism and commentary that established him as a formidable and fearless witness to the injustices, brutalities, and damages of racism, in Europe as well as America. After completing his third novel, Another Country, Baldwin returned to the U.S. in 1962 to involve himself in the Civil Rights movement and stayed, protesting, speaking out, and publishing another essay collection, The Fire Next Time. With Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination, however, Baldwin left America and only returned sporadically. Though later work fell short of his earlier high standards, Baldwin never faded from view. The issues he so bravely and brilliantly addressed decades ago remain central to American society, and his work continues to be a source of inspiration for writers and readers today.