James Baldwin

Baldwin's stepfather, David Baldwin, was a factory worker and a store-front preacher; James was the first of nine children. David was a very cruel person at home, which the young James hated. His father opposed the young Baldwin's literary aspirations but he found support from a very nice white teacher as well as the mayor of New York City Fiorello H. LaGuardia. His most important support came from his idol Richard Wright, whom he had called "the greatest black writer in the world for me". Wright helped him to secure the Eugene F. Saxon Memorial Award. Wright and Baldwin became friends for a short time, and Baldwin titled a collection of essays Notes of a Native Son, in clear reference to Wright's enraged and despairing novel Native Son. However, Baldwin's essay "Everybody's Protest Novel" in 1949 ended the two author's friendship because Baldwin asserted that Wright's novel Native Son ´like Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin lacked credible characters and psychological complexity.

Baldwin, like many American authors of the time, left to live in Europe for an extended period of time beginning in 1948. His first destination was Paris where he followed in the footsteps of Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Richard Wright, and many others.

When Baldwin returned to America, he became actively involved in the Civil Rights Movement. He marched with Martin Luther King, Jr. to Washington D.C.

Selected works

• The Amen Corner
• Another Country
• The Fire Next Time
• Go Tell It on the Mountain
• Going to Meet the Man
• Notes of a Native Son
• Nobody Knows My Name: More Notes of a Native Son
• The Price of the Ticket
• Giovanni's Room

External link

• Several brief biographical sketches.

Referenced By