Another Country

This is an extremely intense, beautiful, and believable book about the complicated textures of relationships. Not only about the "typical" man-woman union, Baldwin's richly woven story also contains homosexual and bisexual relationships; inter-racial relationships; intricate and deeply explored male friendships; and, to a lesser degree (though with no less accuracy), the careful dance of women's friendships. The relationship between blacks and whites. The relationship between racists and non-racists. The relationship between the rich and the poor, between sell-outs and non sell-outs. So much is touched upon and examined in this novel that the 436 pages seem more like 600, and by the end I found myself taking notes. But the complexity was not at all daunting. Because of Baldwin's deep (but never boring) detailing and because of the fact that all of these topics are limited to the lives of six main characters, I was completely enthralled and moved, and often had to pause to consider my own feelings and viewpoints.To me, this book is amazing simply because James Baldwin is able to make a thirty year old midwestern girl feel as though she thoroughly knows and understands a fictional group of struggling and eclectic writers and musicians from 1960's New York City. With _Another Country_, so aptly titled because Rufus, Vivaldo, Cass, Richard, Eric and Ida each seem to have their own, Baldwin was also able to further open a mind I thought was pretty wide already.

Gay, straight. Man, Woman. Black, White. Foreign, American. Poor, Rich. Abuser, Abused. This novel deconstructs each of these binaries and challenges so many notions on so many levels it can be called no less than a masterpiece. This book takes the reader on a journey around the world and through the human heart. It asks the reader what it is to love. It speaks to all levels of the human experience. A book one can read over and over finding new things each time. In Book One, we are introduced not only to the white elite of Manhattan, but the homeless dirt poor of that same isle. We are confronted with suicide, domestic violence, and the taboos and non-chalance of a different time. In Book Two, we learn of another character, his lover, and the story of staying true to one's loyal companion while confronting the temptations that come with fame, loss, and familiarty. Baldwin succinctly wraps up this near-epic in Book Three. This book still affects me today. Rocking some of my true hardcore ideals. A must read for anyone with a mature mind.

I can only echo the praise of several other of the reviewers here. This has always been my favorite of all Baldwin's novels, one that literally saved my life at the time I first read it. My deep empathy with the pain the characters were undergoing (so like what I myself was feeling at the time) and the gratitude I felt for the fact that they were SO eloquent in being able to verbalize that pain made this book an indelible a part of my life. In the years since my first exposure to it, I have read and re-read it innumerable times and it never fails to have a profound effect on me. As close to Dostoyevsky as any American novel has ever come, in my opinion. No distancing irony -- it's a book that believes deeply and asks you to feel deeply (the ultimate crime, it seems, in these post-modern times when you're never supposed to be caught actually CARING about anything). There's no way I could recommend it highly enough.

I felt after reading this book almost as if I had just finished viewing a round table discussion about racial conflict, class conflict, and bisexuality all wrapped in one. I am blessed to have known such rich and visionary literature. This is a very insightful book. Baldwin comes at his subject matter fired up, yet without extreme bias. His pendulum is shifty, and raises quizzical emotions from the reader. Baldwin tackles issues of mammoth social and political porportion with profound insight. I had heard that this book was an insider's look at Homophobia in the late 50's and early 60's- I had heard wrong. This book is a study of diversity, acceptance, and love. It forces the reader to probe the age old query- Is it really possible to be in love with two people at the same time? I can only conclude that juggling 2 or more lovers, like some of these characters do, must be like walking into a pit of fire- the endeavors are certain to scar you, and change your view of love and the world for ever. I think at least one of the characters is in love with the existential high of being wanted and being a lover, more than being eternally and unconditionally loved in general. It forces one to really question norms and prohibitons, how fickle and momentary they actually are- how we change our own prohibitions to suit us personally.This book is a profoundly courageous exhibit of power, rage, societal pressure and persuasion, desperation, and violence. It is not a book that corrupts an OPEN mind, yet a glimpse at all of the corruptive evils that still exist in the U.S. after nearly forty years. It is a glimpse at the journey toward capturing the "brass ring" in one's life, the writing probes the question: Is all of the pain and suffering really worth it? Baldwin leaves this reader feeling that the lessons learned along the way in one's coming of age echo far more deeply into the cavern of one's soul, than obtaining the brass ring itself. This is a profound, ground shattering breakthrou! gh in writing for ANY era. His writing will never go out of style for the intelligent and savvy literary thinker---- An open mind is an estuary, abundantly seeking the richest minerals that the tide has to offer! Read this vividly moving tale with a blind fold, and seek to learn from it.

Baldwin offers the most unique insight to race and sexuality in America ever offered the reading public. This book is a must-read for anyone with half a brain (those without, like the customer who thought it "pollutes the mind" with its sexual themes, will do best to stick to John Grisham and Tom Clancy. Fight through the dreary first chapters and let yourself be sucked in by the rich characters' inexplicable humanism.