©Allan Warren
Books by James Baldwin
James Arthur Baldwin (1924-1987) was an American writer.
“There has been a renaissance when it comes to Baldwin’s work in the last maybe four to five years. People have really returned to his books…He was just exceptional at understanding history and understanding people and knowing that we constantly repeat our mistakes, because we are constantly denying our history and refusing to reckon with it. Baldwin knew that better than almost anyone else. He was fantastic.” Robert Jones Jr.
Begin Again: James Baldwin’s America and its Urgent Lessons for Today by Eddie Glaude is an introduction to the life and work of Baldwin. “This title is written by a man who has been reading James Baldwin—both as a professor and as an African American who wants to understand the world he’s in—for most of his adult life. He has taken not the fiction of Baldwin, but the nonfiction, starting with The Fire Next Time (published in 1963) and going on through the seventies and right up until his death in 1987.” Patrick Wright, judge for the 2021 British Academy Book Prize for Global Cultural Understanding.
Another recommended book about Baldwin is The Fire Is Upon Us: James Baldwin, William F. Buckley Jr., and the Debate over Race in America. “This is a book that you finish reading and you’re mad you’re done, it’s so so so good…Nicholas Buccola is a wonderful political theorist. He does a fine job of helping us to know Buckley and Baldwin in much greater depth.” Myisha Cherry, American philosopher, recommends books on anger about racial injustice.
“To me, no matter how corny what I am about to say might sound, there is no purer artistic expression of the power of love – regardless of sexuality – than Tish and Fonny’s love in that novel. To Baldwin, as with a writer like Tennessee Williams, sexuality and emotionality are inextricably linked; sexuality becomes a means through which to express the depthless nature of one’s adoration for another.” Read more...
Ahmed Honeini, Literary Scholar
“Choosing The Price of the Ticket was kind of a cheat because the volume contains most of Baldwin’s substantive nonfiction, including Notes of a Native Son, Nobody Knows My Name, The Devil Finds Work, and yes, The Fire Next Time. I simply couldn’t bring myself to choose only one of his essay collections, because to do so would diminish or underrepresent just how incisive and persuasive Baldwin’s prowess as a public intellectual was and remains.” Read more...
Ahmed Honeini, Literary Scholar
“Sister Margaret Alexander, the church pastor at the heart of the play, is a wonderfully exuberant figure who does exactly what Baldwin thought that the church-as-theatre should do: she involves her congregation, she shakes them up, and she tries to change them, no matter how forcefully. Yet her attempts at exercising authority over her flock while also denying her personal history renders her position within the church untenable by the play’s end and contributes to her exile.” Read more...
Ahmed Honeini, Literary Scholar
Giovanni's Room
by James Baldwin
In Baldwin's second novel, an American expat living in the Bohemian bars and clubs of 1950s Paris grapples with his bisexual identity. Writing in The Guardian, the novelist Garth Greenwell said: "the whole novel is a kind of anatomy of shame, of its roots and the myths that perpetuate it, of the damage it can do. "
“Go Tell It on the Mountain is Baldwin’s first novel and is, to me, the perfect introduction to his work. The novel takes place primarily on the birthday of its protagonist, fourteen-year-old preacher John Grimes, and is based closely upon Baldwin’s own childhood. Baldwin, in painstaking and exquisite detail, foregrounds John’s experiences within his church, the Temple of the Fire Baptized; his contentious relationship with his family, especially his father; his efforts to reconcile his burgeoning queerness with his religious upbringing, and the fear and shame that emerges as a result.” Read more...
Ahmed Honeini, Literary Scholar
“This is my favorite novel by James Baldwin; it was his last one, published in 1979. You don’t hear as much about it as you do about his early novels…It’s a lovely novel, but also a pretty dark one. One of the main characters is sexually abused by her father at a young age, but all the characters have been damaged by abuses and societal pressures in ways that you might think are irreparable. Baldwin shows us that one can repair oneself with love.” Read more...
Jenny Davidson, Literary Scholar
Interviews where books by James Baldwin were recommended
The Best Love Stories, recommended by Jenny Davidson
From Jane Austen to James Baldwin, the best love stories in literature recommended by Jenny Davidson, novelist, historian and Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University.
The Best James Baldwin Books, recommended by Ahmed Honeini
James Baldwin was a hugely influential figure in 20th-century writing – “one of the foremost American authors of his generation” – explains the literary scholar Ahmed Honeini, as he offers an overview of Baldwin’s remarkably varied output, which comprises “extraordinarily creative” fiction and playwriting as well as a body of searing social commentary.
Best Books by Black Queer Writers, recommended by Robert Jones Jr.
The novels of James Baldwin, Alice Walker, Wallace Thurman and James Early Hardy bring the America of the last two centuries vividly to life. Marlon James brings us a fantasy trilogy set in ancient Africa. Robert Jones Jr., author of The Prophets—a love story set on a plantation in the American South—talks us through his choices of the best books by Black queer writers.
Novels Set In Paris
If you’re planning a trip to the City of Lights—or in the mood for a bit of armchair travel—then you might like to get yourself in the mood by picking up a novel set in Paris. From the Francophone masterpieces of Victor Hugo to more modern classics by Hemingway and Mantel, you’re sure to find a book to suit your tastes among our expert recommendations.
