As essayist, James Baldwin has written
about life in Harlem, Paris, Atlanta; about Martin Luther King, Malcolm
X, Jimmie Carter; and about Richard Wright, Lorraine Hansberry, Norman
Mailer. In examining contemporary culture, he has turned his attention
to politics, literature, the movies—and most importantly to his own
self. To each subject he has brought the conviction, stated in the 1953
essay “Stranger in the Village,” that “the interracial drama acted out
on the American continent has not only created a new black man, it has
created a new white man, too.” Thus he has consistently chosen as his
audience Americans, both black and white, and has offered them
instruction about the failings and possibilities of their unique
national society.
Several of the essays in Notes of a Native Son (1955), published two years after his first novel, Go Tell It on the Mountain, are regarded as contemporary classics because of their polished style and timeless insights. The Price of the Ticket: Collected Nonfiction 1948–1985 marks his long, productive career as an essayist. It includes over forty shorter pieces as well as three book-length essays—The Fire Next Time (1963), No Name in the Street (1972), and The Devil Finds Work (1976). Baldwin’s most recent book is The Evidence of Things Not Seen
(1985), a meditation on the Atlanta child-murder case. It is his
troubled and troubling personal reencounter with “the terror of being
destroyed” that dominates the inescapable memories of his own early life
in America. ... [mehr] https://lithub.com/james-baldwin-i-never-intended-to-become-an-essayist/
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