James Baldwin: Travels and Bibliography
James Arthur Baldwin (Aug 2, 1924–Dec 1, '87) was an American novelist, playwright, essayist, poet & activist. His essays explore intricacies of racial, sexual, & class distinctions in, most notably, the mid-twentieth-century USA. Some of his essays are book-length, incl. The Fire Next Time, No Name in the Street, & The Devil Finds Work. An unfinished manuscript, Remember This House, was expanded & adapted for cinema as the Academy Award–nominated documentary I Am Not Your Negro. His novel, If Beale Street Could Talk, was adapted into an Academy-Award-winning drama by Barry Jenkins.
His novels, short stories, & plays fictionalize fundamental personal questions & dilemmas amid complex social & psychological pressures. Themes of masculinity, sexuality, race, & class intertwine to create intricate narratives that run parallel w/ some of the major political movements toward social change in mid-twentieth-century USA, eg. the Civil Rights Movement & the Gay Liberation Movement.
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