A Historical Guide to James Baldwin

by Douglas Field

Overview

With contributions from major scholars of African American literature, history, and cultural studies, A Historical Guide to James Baldwin focuses on the four tumultous decades that defined the great author's life and art. Providing a comprehensive examination of Baldwin's varied body of work that includes short stories, novels, and polemical essays, this collection reflects the major events that left an indelible imprint on the iconic writer: civil rights, black nationalism and the struggle for gay rights in the pre- and post-Stonewall eras. The essays also highlight Baldwin's under-studied role as a trans-Atlantic writer, his lifelong struggle with faith, and his use of music, especially the blues, as a key to unlock the mysteries of his identity as an exile, an artist, and a black American in a racially hostile era.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780190451196
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	09/24/2009
Series:	Historical Guides to American Authors
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Douglas Field is Lecturer in Contemporary Literature, Staffordshire University, UK and he is the book review editor for Callaloo.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments Abbreviations Introduction Douglas Field James Baldwin, 1924-1987: A Brief Biography Randall Kenan BALDWIN IN HIS TIME James Baldwin as Religious Writer: The Burdens and Gifts of Black Evangelicalism Clarence E. Hardy III Using the Blues: Baldwin and Music D. Quentin Miller James Baldwin and Sexuality: Lieux de M?moire within a Usable Past Justin A. Joyce & Dwight A. McBride Challenging the American Conscience, Re-imagining American Identity: James Baldwin and the Civil Rights Movement Lynn Orilla Scott ?In the Same Boat': James Baldwin and the Other Atlantic Magdalena J. Zaborowska Illustrated Chronology Bibliographic Essay: The Price of the Ticket: Baldwin Criticism in Perspective Carol E. Henderson Contributors Index

Editorial Reviews

"A Historical Guide to James Baldwin is welcome and timely. It caps a decade of renewed interest in this major twentieth-century figure and sets the terms of debate for the decade to come. Moreover, as a Baldwin scholar and a student in an undergraduate seminar on
Baldwin, we can testify to how it speaks to scholars at all levels and lends itself to course adoption...This collection belongs on the shelf of any Baldwin scholar, student, or aficionado." —Brian Norman and Lauren A. Wilson, Callaloo

From the Publisher