MATTHEW HAWKINS applauds a psychotherapist’s disection of William Blake
The political formation of James Baldwin
JENNY FARRELL traces the critical role that the CPUSA played in the education of Harlem’s greatest man of letters
Civil Rights March on Washington, DC (L to R) Charlton Heston, James Baldwin and Marlon Brando, with Sidney Poitier standing behind. August 28 1963
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New releases from Christina Alden and Alex Patterson, Odette Michell, Clementine Lovell
JOHN GREEN is fascinated by a very readable account of Britain’s involvement in South America
Strip cartoons used to be the bread and butter of newspapers and they have been around for centuries. MICHAL BONCZA asks our own Paul Tanner about which bees are in his bonnet
GORDON PARSONS acknowledges the authority with which Sarah Kane’s theatrical justification for suicide has resonance today
RON JACOBS welcomes a timely homage to one of the IWW and CPUSA’s most effective orators
JAMES BALDWIN, the important left-wing polemicist, black author and activist, was born one hundred years ago in Harlem, New York, August 2 1924. His writing career encompassed bestselling novels, essays, plays and articles.
Baldwin’s stepfather David, a Pentecostal preacher, was a factory worker, earning too little to provide for his family of nine children. His mother Berdis, a migrant from the South, worked in domestic service. The young James’s first encounter with police at the age of 10 brought home to him the realities of racism. David’s preaching initially led the teenage Baldwin to become a young minister.
During his time at Public School 124 in Harlem (with its first black principal, Gertrude Ayers), Baldwin’s potential was recognised by Orilla Miller, a white teacher and communist from the Midwest. Miller introduced him to literature and theatre, including A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens and the landmark play Voodoo Macbeth, directed by Orson Welles with an all-black cast.
More from this author
On the centenary of the birth of the anti-colonial thinker and activist Frantz Fanon, JENNY FARRELL assesses his enduring influence
JENNY FARRELL relishes a modern parable that challenges readers to confront the legacies of empire, and the possibilities of resistance
As Caspar David Friedrich’s 250th anniversary is celebrated in Berlin and New York, JENNY FARRELL urges viewers of the German Romantic painter to understand its true historical context, and beware its co-option by the far-right
As Caspar David Friedrich’s 250th anniversary is celebrated in Berlin and New York, JENNY FARRELL urges viewers of the German Romantic painter to understand its true historical context, and beware his co-option by the far right
